
■«=i. uV >i 



Book 



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COFmiGIlT DEPOSIT. 



L 



THE MODERN LIBRARY 
OF THE world's BEST BOOKS 



SELECTED ADDRESSES 

AND 

PUBLIC PAPERS 

O F 

WOODROW WILSON 



THE MODERN LIBPtARY 



05CAR Wilde Dorian Gray; Poems; 

Fairy Tales and Poems in Prose 
Str'.ndberg Married; 

Miss Julie and other plays 
Kipling Soldiers Three 

Stevenson Treasure Island 

Henrik Ibsen A Doll's House, Etc. ; 

HeddaGabler, Etc.; 

The Wild Duck; Rosmersholm; 

The League of Youth 
Anatole France The Red Lily; 

The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard 
De Maupassant 

T7ne Vie; Mademoiselle Fifi, Etc. 
DosTOYEVsKY Poor Pcoplc 

Mi»ETERLINCK 

A Miracle of St. Anthony, Etc. 

ScrfOPENHAUER 

Studies in Pessimism 
Samuel Butler 

The Way of All Flesh 
George Meredith 

Diana of the Crossways 
G. B, Shaw An Unsocial Socialist 
Geo. Moore 

Confessions of a Young Man 
Thomas Hardy 

Mayor of Casterbridge 
Thos. Seltzer Best Russian Stories 
Nietzsche Beyond Good and Evil; 

Thus Spake Zarathustra; 

Genealogy of Morals 
Turgenev Fathers and Sons 

Swinburne Poems 

Wm. Dean Howells 

A Hazard of New Fortunes 
W. S. Gilbert 

The Mikado and other Plays 
Gustave Flaubert Madame Bovary 
James Stephens Mary, Mary 

Anton Chekhov 

Rothschild's Fiddle, Etc. 
Arthur Schnitzuer 

.\natol and other Plays; 

Bertha Garlan 
Sudermann Dame Care 

Lord Dunsany A Dreamer's Tales; 

The Book of Wonder 
G. K. Chesterton 

The Man Who Was Thursday 

Other Titles In Preparation 

Many volumes contain introduotioDH by well-known modern Anthors 

wrltt<»n specially for The Modern Library 



H. G. Wells The War in the Air; 

Ann Veronica 
Haeckel, Weismann, Etc. 

Evolution in Modern Thought 
Francis Thompson 

Complete Poems 
Rodin Art of Rodin 

Aubrey Beardsley 

Art of Aubrey Beardsley 
Balzac Short Stories 

Edward Carpenter 

Love's Coming of Age 
Leonid Andreyev 

The Seven that Were Hanged 
Maxim Gorky 

Creatures that Onoe Were Men 
Max Beerbohm Zuleika Dobson 
Max Stirner 

The Ego and His Own 
George Gissing 

Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft 
Voltaire Candide 

W. B. Yeats 

Irish Fairy and Folk Tales 
Theophile Gautier 

Mile. De Maupin 
WooDROW Wilson 

Addresses and Messages 
John Macy 

The Spirit-of American Literature 
Francois Villon Poetn« 

Ellen Key, Havelock Ellis, 

G. Lowes Dickinson, Etc. 

The Woman Question 
Frank Norris McTeague 

Henry James 

Daisy Miller and an Interna- 
tional Episode 
Leo Tolstoy 

The Death of Ivan Ilyitch and 
Other Stories 
Gabriele D'Annunzio 

The Flame of Life 
Modern Book of English Verse 

Edited by Richard LeGallienne 
Modern Book of American Vers* 

Edited by Richard LeGallienne 
May Sinclair The Belfry 



SELECTED ADDRESSES 

AND 

PUBLIC PAPERS 

OF 

WOOD ROW WILSON 

EDITED WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 

ALBERT BUSHNELL HART 



-i^\iia-«-^''*^-^ 




BONI AND LIVERIGHT, INC. 



PUBLISHERS 



NEW YORK 



Copyright, 1918, by 
Boni & Liveright, Inc. 



JAfJ -3!9!9' 

©CI.A512108 ^ 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

INTRODUCTION i-v 

YEAR 1913 1-21 

A New President's Principles (First Inaugural Ad- 
dress) — 1-5; Grover Cleveland (Letter on Dedication 
OF Cleveland's Birthplace) — 5-6; Reform of the 
Tariff (Address to Congress) — 6-8; The Tariff 
Lobby (Statement Given to the Press) — 9; The 
Nation and the Soldier (Address at Gettysburg) 
— 10-13 ; To THE Citizens of the Philippine Islands 
(Message Sent by Governor-General Harrison) — 13; 
Ideals of the College (Address at Swarthmore Col- 
lege) — 14-16; Relations with Latin America (Ad- 
dress Before the Southern Commercial Congress 
AT Mobile)— 16-21 

YEAR 1914 22-60 

Regulation of Trusts (Address to Congress) — 21-27; 
Tolls on the Panama Canal (Address to Congress) 
— 27-28 ; Patriotism and the Sailor (Address at the 
Unveiling of the Statue of Commodore John Barry) 
—38-32; The Men Who Fought for the Union 
At^EMORiAL Day Address at Arlington) — 32-34; 
Union of Spirit Between North and South (Ad- 
dress at a Monument in Memory of the Confeder- 
ate Dead at Arlington) — 34-36; The Naval Service 
(Address at the Naval Academy, Annapolis) — 36-39; 
America as a World Power (Address at Independ- 
ence Hall, Philadelphia) — 39-44; Neutrality of 
Feeling (A Presidential Proclamation) — 44-46; In- 
ternational and Municipal Law (Address Before 
the American Bar Association) — 46-48; The Young 
Men's Christian Association (Address Before the 
American Bar Association) — 49-55; Foreign Trade 
AND Ship Building (Address to Congress)— 55-60. 

YEAR 1915 61-94 

The Democratic Party (Jackson Day Address at 
Indianapolis) — 61-67; Proper Tests of Immigrants 
(Veto Message of the Literacy Test Bill) — 67-70; 
National Commerce (Address to the United States 
Chamber of Commerce, at Washington)— 70-77; A 
Confused World at War (Address to the Confer- 
ence OF Methodist Protestant Church at Wash- 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

ington)— 77-78; America First (Address at a Meet- 
ing OF THE Associated Press at New York) — 78-83; 
The Laws of Neutrality (Despatch Sent Through 
Secretary Bryan to Germany) — 83-85; Citizens of 
Foreign Birth (Address to Naturalized Citizens at 
Convention Hall, Philadelphia) — 85-89; Sinking of 

THE "LuSITANIA" (DESPATCH OF PROTEST ThROUGH SEC- 
RETARY Bryan to Germany) — 89-90; What the Flag 
Means (Address at Flag Day Exercises, Washing- 
ton)— 90-93; Preparedness for Defense (Address to 
the Civilian Advisory Board of the Navy at the 
White House)— 93-94. 

YEAR 1916 95-170 

What Is Pan- Americanism ? (Address to Pan-Am- 
erican Scientific Congress at Washington) — 95-100; 
Need of an Army and Navy (Address at New York) 
— 100-105 ; How to Avoid War (Letter to Senator 
Stone) — 105-107; Basis of American Foreign Policy 
(Address to the Gridiron Club at Washington) — 
107-109 ; Right of Americans to Traverse the Seas 
(Letter to Representative Pou on the McLemore 
Resolution) — 109-110; Expedition into Mexico 
(Statement to the Press) — 110-111; Ultimatum on 
Submarine Warfare (Address to Congress) — 111-116; 
Qualifications of a Supreme Court Justice (Let- 
ter to Senator Culberson on Mr. Brandeis) — 117- 
120; German Abandonment of the Submarine Pol- 
icy (Despatch to the German Government Through 
Secretry Lansing) — 120-121 ; How to Enforce Peace 
(Address to the League to Enforce Peace at Wash- 
ington) ; 121-125; Preparedness to the Soldier (Ad- 
dress AT the Military Academy, West Point) — 125- 
131; Democracy of Business (Address at Salesman- 
ship Congress, Detroit) — 132-137; Preparedness to 
Preserve Peace (Address at Toledo) — 138-139; Loy- 
alty (Address at Citizenship Convention, Wash- 
ington)— 139-143 ; An Eight-Hour Day for Railroad 
Men (Address to Congress) — 143-150; Abr.\ham Lin- 
coln (Address at the Lincoln Birthplace Farm, 
at Hodgenville) — 150-154; The Forces of Freedom 
(Address at Suffrage Convention, Atlantic City) — 
154-157; World Business of America (Address to 
the Grain Dealers' Association, at Baltimore) — 
157-162; A Society of Nations (Address at Cincin- 
nati)— 162-164; The End of Isolation (Address at 
Shadow Lawn) — 104-165; The Right Hand to La- 
bor (Address to the American Federation of Labor, 
AT the White House)— 165-166 ; The Way to Peace 
(Despatch Partly in Reply to German Proposition 
OF Peace, Through Secretary Lansing)— 167-170. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 
YEAR 1917 171-240 

Support for the Red Cross (Public Appeal as Presi- 
dent OF THE Red Cross)— 171-172; Conditions of 
Peace (Address to the Senate)— 172-179; Breach 
with Germany (Address to Congress)— 179-183 ; A 
Great Inventor (Letter to Thomas A. Edison on 
His 70th Birthday) — 183; Political Principles of 
Americans (Second Inaugural Address) — 184-188; 
Necessity of War Against Germany (Address to 
Congress) — 188-197; The American People Must 
Support the War (Public Appeal by the Presidpnt 
to His Fellow Countrymen) — 197-201; The Red 
Cross (Address at the Dedication of the Red Cross 
Building in Washington) — 202-204; Objects in Go- 
ing TO War (Letter to Representative Heflin) — 
204-205 ; Need of a Censorship Law (Letter to Repre- 
sentative Webb) — 205-206; Friendship with Russia 
(Cablegram to Russia) — 206-208; Defenders of 
American Honor (Address at Arlington Cemetery)- 
— 209-210; Insults and Aggressions of Germany (Ad- 
dress ON Flag Day at Washington) — 210-211 ; Greet- 
ing TO French Democracy (Cablegram to the French 
C^overnment) — 217; The Bible and the Soldier 
(Message to Soldiers and Sailors)— 217-218 ; Patri- 
otic Teaching in Schools (Public Appeal to School 
Officers) — 218-219; Papal Propositions of Peace 
(Reply to the Pope Through Secretary Lansing) — 
219-222; To the Soldiers of the National Army 
(Public Message to the Drafted Men) — 222-223; 
The Junior Red Cross (Proclamation to the School 
Children of the United States) — 223-224; Women 
AND the Suffrage (Reply to a Delegation from the 
New York State Woman's Suffrage Party, at the 
White House) — 224-226; Labor and the War (Ad- 
dress TO THE American Federation of Labor Conven- 
tion AT Buffalo) — 226-230; Universal Loyalty 
(Telegram to the Northwest Loyalty Meetings, 
St. Paul) — 231; Sympathy with the Belgians 
(Cablegram to King Albert of Belgium) — 231-232; 
Extension of the War to Austria-Hungary (Ad- 
dress to Congress) — 232-238; Government Control 
OF Railroads (Public Statement) — 238-240. 

YEAR 1918 . . . . * 241-289 

Organization for the War (Address to Congress) 
— 241-244; Fourteen Conditions of Peace (Address to 
Congress)— 244-251; The Farmers' Patriotism (Mes- 
sage to the Farmers' Conference at Urbana, III.) — 
251-255; HoNCR TO THE Red Cross (Address to the 
Public Meeting in New York, Opening a Campaign 
for the Second Red Cross Fund) — 256-260; War-Time 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Prohibition (Letter to Senator Sheppard) — 260-261; 
Disinterested Service to Latin America (Address to 
Mexican Editors at the White House)— 261-266; 
Four Factors of World Peace (Address at Mount 
Vernon)— 266-269; Lynching Is Unpatriotic (Pub- 
lic Address to Fellow Countrymen)— 270-271 ; Re- 
building OF Palestine (Letter to Rabbi Wise) — 272; 
German War Against Labor (Public Message to 
Labor on Labor Day)— 272-274; A Few Words to 
Austria (Despatch to the Austrian Government 
Through Secretary Lansing) — 275; Five Needs of 
Permanent Peace (Address to Public Meeting in 
New York, Opening the Fourth Liberty Loan) — 
275-282; College Soldiers (Public Message to the 
Student Corps)— 282-283 ; Question of an Armistice 
(Despatch to the German Government Through 
Secretary Lansing)— 283-284; No Negotiated Peace 
with Germany (Despatch to the German Govern- 
ment Through Secretary Lansing)— 284-286 ; The 
Armistice with Germany (Address to Congress) — 
286-289; Address Before Going Abroad (Address to 
Congress)— 289-303. 

INDEX . 305-316 



INTRODUCTION 

This collection of the public communications of President 
Wilson to the American people can only be a selection, 
inasmuch as the space available is not sufficient for more 
than a third of the full text of the public materials pro- 
ceeding from Woodrow Wilson. The principles upon which 
the selection is m.ade should be made clear. Nothing ap- 
pears in this volume of earlier date than the first inaugura- 
tion of President Wilson; at the other time extremity, it is 
brought down as closely as possible to the date of publica- 
tion. Previous collections have been examined, but have 
no influence on the choice of pieces: naturally the most 
significant utterances of the President will find a place in 
any collection. The foundation for the text is a set of 
pamphlet editions of the President's public addresses oblig- 
ingly furnished to the pubHshers by the President's office, 
and referred to throughout, wherever used, as White House 
Pamphlet. Titles are inserted by the editor, since few of the 
documents were originally printed under subject captions. 

Many very characteristic addresses and letters, however, 
are not included in these printed materials, and have been 
searched for through the public records of Congress and the 
periodical and newspaper press. Indications of origin in 
pre\ious collections have furnished useful clues to some 
originals. Other pieces have been found through the pri- 
vate collections of the editor. He has had throughout the 
advantage of the professional skill of David M. Matteson, 
v/hos<e knowledge of the sources of current history has en- 
abled him to run down some important speeches and has 
greatly aided the. editor in the selection and identificaton 
of the documents. The pieces, long and short, number 
liinety-tvvo. x\iL omissions axe mclicated by asLcuSKS (^ "■ "' '^). 



ii INTRODUCTION 

The reader will at once notice that this book includes a 
variety of forms of communication between the President 
and the People. First come the public expositions of the 
President's policy, in his first inaugural address, some of his 
annual messages, and the numerous addresses to Congress 
which have been a feature of the administration. No Presi- 
dent between John Adams and Wilson approached Con- 
gress in any other way ±an througih the wTitten messages 
sent by a subordinate, which were begun by President 
Thomas Jefferson. The three Presidents who immediately 
preceded President Wilson had the habit of expressing views 
intended to affect Congress, through newspaper intervie\vs 
and official statements given out at the White House. They 
often succeeded in creating pubHc opinion that reacted upon 
Congress. President Wilson has accompHshed the same end 
by the more dramatic method of making addresses to Con- 
gi-ess intended for the people at large. These sp)eeches have 
usually been spread widely through the press; most of 
them are brief. Each of them enforces one or at most a 
few suggestions and appeals. In those speeches will be 
found clear and forceful statements of the President's poHcy 
upon such topics as the tariff, trusts, foreign trade, ship- 
building, submarine warfare, conditions of the railroad men, 
and the declaration of war. Only a part of those addresses 
can be brought within the limits of a modest volume such 
as this. 

Some very characteristic short pieces in this volume are 
the letters and telegrams, sent on various occasions, such as 
the dedication of Cleveland's birthplace, the seventieth birth- 
day of the great scientific man, Edison, and greetings to the 
French and Russian governments. 

The "U^ite House is well «.cquainted with the effect of 
short, snappy statements circulated through the unofficial 
methods of the press — such are the p)olitical bomb on the 
tariff lobby in 19 13; the announcement on the expedition 
into Mexico in 191 6; an appeal for support for tiie Red 
Cross and a call to school officers in 191 7; proclamations 
to the school children and to the drafted men in Septem- 
ber, 191 7; and the taking over of the railroads. 

Another group is made up of letters written to public 



INTRODUCTION iii 

men, especially Senators and Representatives, making clear 
the President's attitude on some particular question, and 
thus endeavoring to affect the minds of Congress. Such 
are the letter to Senator Culberson on a pending nomina- 
tion to the Supreme Court, in 191 6; to Representative 
Webb on censorship, in 1917; to Senator Stone on foreign 
difficulties in 19 16. 

More than half of this volume is chosen from the numer- 
ous public addresses of the President on occasions of all 
sorts. Like his immediate predecessors, he has taken the 
ground that a President is the President of the whole people, 
and ought to set forth his policies in all parts of the country 
and to groups of every kind. Hence such addresses as that 
on the Union soldier and the Confederate soldier in 19 14; 
to graduating classes of the Naval and Military Academy; 
before the American Bar Associatioai ; at a Y. M. C. A. 
celebration; to the United States Chamber of Commerce; 
to the Conference of the Methodist Protestant Church; to 
the Associated Press meeting; to naturalized citizens; to the 
Pan-American Scientific Congress; to the Gridiron Club; to 
the Convention of the American Federation of Labor; to a 
Woman's Suffrage delegation. These addresses set forth the 
difficulties of the President, often point the moral of some 
desirable proposition or action then pending, and always 
appeal to patriotic sentiment. 

xAmong the most important documents are the despatches 
to Germany, upon the relation of -the United States to the 
great war. These are usually signed by the Secretary of 
State; but these reproduced in this volume were well kno\Mi 
at the time to proceed from the President's pen. Among 
them are several despatches on the submarine and Lusitania 
questions, and the snappy communications of October and 
November, 19 18, on peace. 

The year and a lialf since war broke out with Germany 
has called out so many striking and powerful expressions 
from the President that nearly half of the ninety-two num- 
bers have been taken from that period. For several years 
previous, the President had been reflecting and speaking 
oh the European war, the neutral duties of the United 
States, and the questions of defense. Upon his mind, as 



ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT 
WOODROW WILSON 

YEAR 1913 

I. A NEW PRESIDENT'S PRINCIPLES 

(March 4, 1913) 
First Inaugural Address 

There has been a change of government. It began two 
years ago, when the House of Representatives became Demo- 
cratic by a decisive majority. It has now been completed. 
The Senate about to assemble will also be Democratic. 
The offices of President and Vice President have been put 
into the hands of Democrats. VvTiat does tlie change mean? 
That is the question that is uppermost in our minds to-day. 
That is the question I am going to try to answer, in order, 
if I may, to interpret the occasion. 

It means much more than the mere success of a party. 
The success of a party means little except when the Nation 
is using that party for a large and definite purpose. No 
one can mistake the purpose for which the Nation now 
seeks to use the Democratic party. It seeks to use it to 
interpret a change in its own. plans and point of view. 
Some old things with which we had grown familiar, and 
which had begun to creep into the very habit of our thought 
and of our lives, have altered their aspect as we have lat- 
terly looked critically upon them, with fresh, awakened eyes; 
have dropped tlieir disguises and shown themselves alien and 
sinister. Some new things, as we look frankly upon them, 
willing to comprehend their real character, have come to 
assume the aspect of things long believed in and familiar, 

I 



I 



2 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

stuff of our own convictions. We have been refreshed by a 
new insight into our own life. 

We see that in many things life is very great. It is 
incomparably great in its material aspects, in its body of 
wealth, in the diversity and sweep of its energy, in' the 
industries which have been conceived and built up by the 
genius of individual men and the limitless enterprise of 
groups of men. It is great, also, very great, in its moral 
force. Nowhere else in the world have noble men and 
women exhibited in more strildng forms the beauty and the 
energy of sympathy and helpfulness and counsel in their 
efforts to rectify wrong, alleviate suffering, and set the weak 
in the way of strength and hope. We have built up, more- 
over, a great system of government, which has stood through 
a long age as in many respects a model for those who seek 
to set liberty upon foundations that will endure against 
fortuitous change, against storm and accident. Our life con- 
tains every great thing, and contains it in rich abundance. 

But the evil has come with the good, and much fine gold 
has been corroded. With riches has come inexcusable w^aste. 
"We have squandered a great part of w^at we might have 
used, and have not stopped to conserve the exceeding 
bounty of nature, without w^hich our genius for enterprise 
would have been worthless and impotent, scorning to be 
careful, shamefully prodigal as well as admirably efficient. 
We have been proud of our industrial achievements, but we 
have not hitherto stopped thoughtfully enough to count the 
human cost, the cost of lives snuffed out, of energies over- 
taxed and broken, the fearful physical and spiritual cost to 
the men and women and children upon whom the dead 
weight and burden of it aN has fallen pitilessly the years 
through. The groans and agony of it all had not yet reached 
our ears, the sdemn, mo\ing undertone of our life, coming 
up out of the mines and factories and out of every home 
where the struggle had its intimate and familiar seat. With 
the great Government went many deep secret things which 
we too long delayed to look into and scrutinize with candid, 
fearless eyes. The great Government we loved has too 
often been made use of for private and selfish purposes, and 
those who used it had forgotten the people. 



Mar. 4] A NEW PRESIDENT'S PRINCIPLES 3 

At last a vision has been vouchsafed us of our life as a 
whole. We see the bad with the good, the debased and 
decadent with the sound and vital. With this vision we 
approach ne\v affairs. Our duty is to cleanse, to reconsider, 
to restore, to correct the evil v/ithout impairing the good, 
to purify and humanize every process of our common life 
without weakening or sentimentalizing it. There has been 
something crude and heartless and unfeeling in our haste 
to succeed and be great. Our thought has been "Let every 
man look out for himself, let every generation look out for 
itself," while we reared giant machinery which made it im- 
possible that any but those who stood at the levers of control 
should have a chance to look out for themselves. We had 
not forgotten our morals. We remembered vveW enough that 
we had set up a policy which was meant to serve the hum- 
blest as well as the most powerful, with an eye single to the 
standards of justice and fair play, and remembered it with 
pride. But we were very heedless and in a hurry to be 
great. 

We have come now to the sober second thought. The 
scales of heedlessness have fallen from our eyes. We have 
made up our minds to square every process of our national 
life again with the standards we so proudly set up at the 
beginning and have always carried at our hearts. Our 
work is a work of restoration. 

We have itemized with some degree of particularity the 
things that ought to be altered and here are some of the 
chief items: A tariff which cuts us off from our proper 
part in the commerce of the world, violates the just prin- 
ciples of taxation, and makes the Government a facile in- 
strument in the hands of private interests; a banking and 
currency system based upon the necessity of the Government 
to sell its bonds fifty years ago and perfectly adapted to 
concentrating cash and restricting credits; an industrial 
system which, take it on all its sides, financial as well as 
administrative, holds capital in leading strings, restricts the 
liberties and limits the opportunities of labor, and exploits 
without renewing or consen/ing the natural resources of 
the country; a body of agricultural activities never yet 
given the efficiency of great business undertakings or served 



^ ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 13 

as ii should be through the instrumentality of science taken 
directly to the farm, or afforded the facilities of credit best 
suited to its practical needs; watercourses undeveloped, waste 
places unreclaimed, forests untended, fast disappearing with- 
out plan or prospect of renewal, unregarded waste heaps at 
every mine. We have studied as perhaps no other nation 
has the most effective means of production, but we have not 
studied cost or economy as we should either as organizers of 
industry, as statesmen, or as individuals. 

Nor have we studied and perfected the means by which 
government m.ay be put at the service of humanity, in safe- 
guarding the health of the Nation, the health of its men 
and its women and its children, as well as their rights in the 
struggle for existence. This is no sentimental duty. The 
firm basis of government is justice, not pity. These are 
matters of justice. There can be no equality or opportunity, 
the first essential of justice in the body politic, if men and 
women and children be not shielded in their lives, their very 
vitality, from the consequences of great industrial and social 
processes which they can not alter, control, or singly cope 
^\^th. Society must see to it that it does not itself crush or 
weaken or dam.age its o\^ti constituent parts. The first duty 
of law is to keep sound the society it serves. Sanitary laws, 
pure food laws, and laws determining conditions of labor 
which individuals are powerless to determine for themselves 
are intimate parts of the very business of justice and legal 
efficiency. 

These are some of the things we ought to do, and not leave 
the others undone, the old-fashioned, never-to-be-neglected, 
fundamental safeguarding of property and of individual right. 
This is the high enterprise of the new day: To lift e\Try- 
thing that concerns our life as a Nation to the light that 
shines from the hearthfire of every man's conscience and 
vision of the right. It is inconceivable that we should do 
this as partisans; it is inconceivable we should do it in 
ignorance of the facts as they are or in blind haste. We 
shall restore, not destroy. We shall deal with our economic 
system as it is and as it may be modified, not as it might 
be if we had a clean sheet of paper to WTite upon; and 
step by step we shall make it what it should be, in the spirit 



Mar. 4] A NEW PRESIDENT'S PRINCIPLES 5 

of those who question their own wisdom and seek counsel 
and knowledge, not shallow self-satisfaction or the excite- 
ment of excursions whither they can not tell. Justice, and 
only justice, shall always be our motto. 

And yet it will be no cool process ot mere science. The 
Nation has been deeply stirred, stirred bv a solemn passion, 
stirred by the Imowledge of wrongs ot ideals lost, of govern 
ment too often debauched and made an instrument of evil. 
The feelings with which we face this new age of right and 
opportunity sweep across our heartstrings like some air out 
of God's ovm presence, where justice and mercy are recon- 
ciled and the judge and the brother are one. We know our 
task to be no mere task of politics, but a task which shall 
search us through and through, whether we be able to 
understand our time and the need of our people, whether we 
be indeed their spokesmen and interpreters, whether we have 
the pure heart to comprehend and the rectified will to choose 
our high course of action. 

This is not a day of triumph: it is a day of dedication. 
Here muster, not the forces of party, but the forces of 
humanity. Men's hearts wait upon us; men's lives hang in 
the balance; men's hopes call upon us to say what we will 
do. Who shall live up to the great trust? Who dares fail 
to try? I summon all honest men, all patriotic, all forward- 
looking men, to my side. God helping me, I \vill not fail 
them, if they will but counsel and sustain me! 

White House Pamphlet, 



2. GROVER CLEVELAND 

(March 13, 1913) 

Letter on Dedication of Cleveland's Birthplace 

I wish with all my heart that it were possible, consistently 
with the performance of my new duties here, to be present 
on the occasion of the dedication of Mr. Cleveland's birth- 
place to the public as a memorial, but inasmuch as I am 
bound here by obligations I cannot escape, I must content 



6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

myself \^^th requesting that you will read this brief message 
to those assembled. 

From the first, I have been deeply interested in the plan 
to acquire Mr. Cleveland's birthplace for the public, and 
this consummation of the plan seems to me of great sig- 
nificance and delightful om.en. I think it must be evident 
to everyone who has given attention to the matter that the 
feeling of the country — the feeling alike of admiration and 
affection — towards Mr. Cleveland .grows warmer and w^armer 
as the years pass by. As we see him in just perspective, he 
looms up as one of the most notable figures in our long 
line of Presidents. I send these lines, therefore, as a sincere 
tribute of respect and admiration. 

May I not add also my hope that the administration of 
the property may be productive of pleasure and stimulation 
to those engaged in it and a real profit to the community 
at large. 

Boston Transcript, March 13, 19 13. 



3. REFORM OF THE TARIFF 

(April 8, 1913) 

Address to Congress 

* * * I have called the Congress together in extraordi- 
nary session because a duty was laid upon the party now in 
power at the recent elections which it ought to perform 
promptly, in order that the burden carried by the people 
under existing law may be lightened as soon as possible 
and in order, also, that the business interests of the country 
may not be kept too long in suspense as to what the fiscal 
changes are to be to which they will be required to adjust 
themselves. It is clear to the whole country that the tariff 
duties must be altered. They must be changed to meet the 
radical alteration in the conditions of our economic life 
which the country has witnessed within the last generation. 
While the whole face and method of our industrial and 
commercidl life was being changed beyond recognition the 



Apr. 8] REFORM OF THE TARIFF 7 

tariff schedules have remained what they were before the 
change began, or have moved in the direction they were 
given when no large circumstance of our industrial develop- 
ment was what it is to-day. Our task is to square them 
with the actual facts. The sooner that is done the sooner 
we shall escape from suffering from the facts and the sooner 
our men of business will be free to thrive by the law of 
nature (the nature of free business) instead of by the law of 
legislation and artificial arrangement. 

We have seen tariff legislation wander very far afield in 
our day — very far indeed from the field in which our pros- 
perity might have had a normal growth and stimulation. No 
one who looks the facts squarely in the face or knows any- 
thing that lies beneath the surface of action can fail to per- 
ceive the principles upon which recent tariff legislation has 
been based. We long ago passed beyond the modest notion 
of "protecting" the industries of the country and moved 
boldly forward to the idea that they were entitled to the 
direct patronage of the Government. For a long time — a 
time so long that the men now active in public policy hardly 
remember the conditions tliat preceded it — we have sought 
in our tariff schedules to give each group of manufacturers 
or producers what they themselves thought that they needed 
in order to maintain a practically exclusive market as 
against the rest of the world. Consciously or unconsciously, I 
we have built up a set of privileges and exemptions from! 
competition behind which it was easy by any, even the' 
crudest, forms of combination to organize monopoly; until 
at last nothing is normal, nothing is obliged to stand the 
tests of efficiency and economy, in our world of big busi-; 
ness, but ever^^thing thrives by concerted arrangement.! 
Only new principles of action will save us from a final 
hard crystallization of monopoly and a complete loss of thel 
influences that quicken enterprise and keep independent) 
energy alive. 

It is plain what those principles must be We must 
abolish everything that bears even the semblance of privi- 
lege or of any kind of artificial advantage, and put our 
business men and producers under the stimulation of a 
constant necessity to be efficient, economical, and enter- 



8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

prising, masters of competitive supremacy, better workers 
and merchants than any in the world. Aside from the 
duties laid upon articles which we do not, and probably can 
not, produce, therefore, and the duties laid upon luxuries 
and merely for the sake of the revenues they yield, the 
object of the tariff duties henceforth laid must be effective 
competition, the whetting of American wits by contest with 
the wits of the rest of the world. 

It would be unwise to move toward this end headlong, 
with reckless haste, or with strokes that cut at the very 
roots of what has grow^n up amongst us by long process and 
at our own invitation. It does not alter a thing to upset 
it and break it and deprive it of a chance to change. It 
destroys it. We must make changes in our fiscal law^s, in 
our fiscal system., whose object is development, a more free 
and w^holesome development, not revolution or upset or con- 
fusion. We must build up trade, especially foreign trade. 
We need the outlet and the enlarged field of energy more 
than w^e ever did before. We must build up industry as 
well, and must adopt freedom in the place of artificial stimu- 
lation only so far as it will build, not pull down. In dealing 
with the tariff the method by w^hich this may be done will 
be a matter of judgment, exercised item by item. To some 
not accustomed to the excitements and responsibilities of 
greater freedom our methods may in some respects and at 
some points seem heroic, but remedies may be heroic and 
yet be remedies. It is our business to make sure that they 
are genuine remedies. Our object is clear. If our motive is 
above just challenge and only an occasional error of judg- 
ment is chargeable against us, we shall be fortunate. * * * 

White House Pamphlet. 



May 26] THE TARIFF LOBBY 



4. THE TARIFF LOBBY 

(May 26, 1913) 
Statement Given to the Press 

I think that the public ought to know the extraordinary 
exertions being made by the lobby in Washington to gain 
recognition for certain alterations of the Tariff bill. Wash- 
ington has seldom seen so numerous, so industrious or so 
insidious a lobby. The newspapers are being filled ^vith paid 
advertisements calculated to mislead the judgment of public 
men not only, but also the public opinion of the country 
itself. There is every evidence that money without limit isi 
being spent to sustain this lobby and to create an appear- 1 
ance of a pressure of opinion antagonistic to some of thej 
chief items of the Tariff bill. 

It is of serious interest to the country that the people at 
large should have no lobby and be voiceless in these matters, 
while great bodies of astute men seek to create an artificial 
opinion and to overcome the interests of the public for their 
private profit. It is thoroughly worth the while of the 
people of this country to take knowledge of this matter. 
Only public opinion can check and destroy it. 

The Government in all its branches ought to be relieved 
from this intolerable burden and this constant interruption 
to the calm progress of debate. I know that in this I am 
speaking for the members of the two houses, who would 
rejoice as much as I would to be released from this unbear- 
able situation. 

Newspaper Press. 



10 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 13 
5. THE NATION AND THE SOLDIER 

(July 4, 1913) 
Address at Gettysburg 

I need not tell you VN^hat the Battle of Gettysburg meant. 
These gallant men in blue and gray sit all about us here. 
Many of them met upon this ground in grim and deadly 
struggle. Upon these fam.ous fields and hillsides their com- 
rades died about them. In their presence it were an imper- 
tinence to discourse upon how the battle w^ent, how it ended, 
what it signified! But 50 years have gone by since then, 
and I crave the privilege of speaking to you for a few 
minutes of what those 50 years have meant. 

What have they meant? They have meant peace and 
union and vigor, and the maturity and might of a great 
nation. How wholesome and healing the peace has been! 
We have found one another again as brothers and com- 
rades in arms, enemies no longer, generous friends rather, 
our battles long past, the quarrel forgotten — except that we 
shall not forget the splendid valor, the manly devotion of 
the men then arrayed against one another, now grasping 
hands and smiling into each other's eyes. How complete 
the union has become and how dear to all of us, how 
unquestioned, how benign and majestic, as State after State 
has been added to this our great family of free men! How 
handsome the vigor, the maturity, the might of the *reat 
Nation we love with undivided hearts; how full of large 
and confident promise that a life will be \ATought out that 
will crowTi its strength with gracious justice and with a 
happy welfare that \^A\\ touch all alike ^^^th deep content- 
ment! We are debtors to those 50 crowded years; they 
have made us heirs to a mighty heritage. 

But do we deem the Nation complete and finished? 
These venerable men crowding here to this famous field 
have set us a great example of devotion and utter sacrifice. 
They were willing to die that the people might live. But 
their task is done. Their day is turned into evening. They 
look to us to perfect what they established. Their work is 



! July 4] THE NATION AND THE SOLDIER 11 

handed on to us, to be done in another wa}^ but not in 
another spirit. Our day is not over; it is upon us in full 
tide. 

Have affairs paused? Does the Nation stand still? Is 
what the 50 years have wrought since those days of battle 
finished, rounded out, and completed? Here is a great 
people, great ^\ith every force that has ever beaten in the 
lifeblood of mankind. And it is secure. There is no one 
within its borders, there is no power among the nations of 
the earth, to make it afraid. But has it yet squared itself 
with its o\^Ti great standards set up at its birth, when it 
made that first noble, naive appeal to the moral judgment 
of mankind to take notice that a government had now at 
last been established which was to serve men, not masters? 
It is secure in everything except the satisfaction that its life 
is right, adjusted to the uttermost to the standards of right- 
eousness and humanity. The days of sacrifice and cleansing 
are not closed. We have harder things to do than were 
done in the heroic days of war, because harder to see clearly, 
requiring more vision, more calm balance of judgment, a 
more candid searching of the very springs of right. 

Look around you upon the field of Gettysburg! Picture 
the array, the fierce heats and agony of battle, column hurled 
against column, battery bellowing to batteiy! Valor? Yes! 
Greater no man shall see in war; and self-sacrifice, and loss 
to the uttermost; the high recklessness of exalted devotion 
which does not count the cost. We are made by these tragic, 
epic things to know what it costs to make a nation — the 
blood and sacrifice of multitudes of unknown men lifted to a 
great stature in the view of all generations by knowing no 
limit to their manly willingness to serve. In armies thus 
marshaled from, the ranks of free men you will see, as it were, 
a nation embattled, the leaders and the led, and may know, 
if you will, how little except in form its action differs in 
days of peace from its action in days of war. 

May we break camp now and be at ease? Are the forces 
that fight for the Naton dispersed, disbanded, gone to their 
homes forgetful of the common cause? Are our forces dis- 
organized, without constituted leaders and the might of men 
consciously united because we contend, not with armies, but 



12 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 13 

with principalities and powers and wickedness in high 
places? Are we content to lie still? Does our union mean 
sympathy, our peace contentment, our vigor right action, 
our maturity self-comprehension and a clear confidence in 
choosing what we shall do? War fitted us for action, and 
action never ceases. 

I have been chosen the leader of the Nation. I can not 
justify the choice by any quaHties of my own, but so it has 
come about, and here I stand. Whom do I command? 
The ghostly hosts who fought upon these battle fields long 
ago and are gone? These gallant gentlemen stricken in 
years whose fighting days are over, their glory won? What 
are the orders" for them, and who rallies them? I have in 
my mind another host, whom these set free of civil strife in 
order that they might work out in days of peace and settled 
order the life 'of a great Nation. That host is the people 
themselves, the great and the small, without class or dif- 
ference of kind or race or origin; and undivided in interest, 
if we have but the vision to guide and direct them and order 
their lives aright in what we do. Our constitutions are their 
articles of enlistment. The orders of the day are the laws 
upon our statute books. What we strive for is their freedom, 
their right to lift themselves from day to day and behold the 
things they have hoped for, and so make w^ay for still better 
days for those whom they love w^ho are to come after them. 
The recruits are the little children crowding in. The quar- 
termaster's stores are in the mines and forests and fields, 
in the shops and factories. Every day something must be 
done to push the cam.paign forward; and it must be done 
by plan and with an eye to some great destmy. 

How shall we hold such thoughts in our hearts and not 
be moved? I would not have you live even to-day wholly 
in the past, but would wish to stand with you in the light 
that streams uix)n us now out of that great day gone by. 
Here is the nation God has builded by our hands. ^ What 
shall we do with it? Who stands ready to act again and 
always in the spirit of this day of reunion and hope and 
patriotic fervor? The day of our country's life has but 
broadened into morning. Do not put uniforms by. Put 



July 4] THE NATION AND THE SOLDIER 13 

the harness of the present on. Lift your eyes to the great 
tracts of life yet to be conquered in the interest of righteous 
peace, of that prosperity which lies in a people's hearts and 
outlasts all wars and errors of men. Come, let us be com- 
rades and soldiers yet to serve our fellow men in quiet 
counsel, when the blare of trumpets is neither heard nor 
heeded and where the things are done which make blessed 
the nations of the world in peace and righteousness and love. 

White Hmise Pamphlet. 



6. TO THE CITIZENS OF THE PHILIPPINE 
ISLANDS 

(October 6, 19 13) 

Message Sent by Governor- General Harrison 

We regard ourselves as trustees acting not for the advan- 
tage of the United States but for the benefit of the people 
of the Philippine Islands. Every step we take will be taken 
with a view to the ultimate independence of the islands and 
as a preparation for that independence; and we hope to 
move toward that end as rapidly as the safety and the per- 
manent interests of the islands will permit. After each step 
taken experience will guide us to the next. 

The Administration will take one step at once. It will give 
to the native citizens of the islands a majority in the ap- 
pointive commission and thus in the Upper as well as in the 
Lower House of the Legislature a majority representation will 
be secured to them. It will do this in the confident hope and 
expectation that immediate proof will thereby be given, in 
the action of the commission under the new arrangement, of 
the political capacity of those native citizens w^ho have al- 
ready come fonvard to represent and to lead their people in 
affairs. 

New York Times, Oct. 7, 1913. 



14 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 
7. IDEALS OF THE COLLEGE 

(October 25, 1913) 
Address at Swarthmore College 

* * * No one can stand in the presence of a gathering 
like this, on a daj^ suggesting the memories which this day 
suggests, without asking himself what a college is for. There 
have been times when I have suspected that certain under- 
graduates did not know. I remember that in days of dis- 
couragement as a teacher I gratefully recalled the sympathy 
of a friend of mine in the Yale faculty, who said that after 
20 years of teaching he had come to the conclusion that the 
human mind had infinite resources for resisting the intro- 
duction of knowledge. Yet I have my serious doubts as to 
whether the main object of a college is the introduction of 
knowledge. It may be the transmission of knowledge 
through the human system, but not much of it sticks. Its 
introduction is temporary; it is for the discipline of the 
hour. Most of what a man learns in college he assiduously 
forgets afterwards. Not because he purposes to forget it, 
but because tlie crowding events of the days that follow 
seem somehow to eliminate it. 

What a man ought never to forget with regard to a college 
is that it is a nursery of principle and of honor. I can not 
help thinking of William Penn as a sort of spiritual knight 
who went out upon his adventures to carry the torch that 
had been put in his hands, so that other men might have 
the path illuminated for them which led to justice and to 
liberty. I can not admit tliat a man establishes his right 
to call himself a college graduate by showing me his diploma. 
The only way he can prove it is by showing that his eyes 
are lifted to some horizon which other men less instructed 
than he have not been privileged to see. Unless he carries 
freight of the spirit he has not been bred where spirits are 
bred. * * * 

The spirit of Penn will not be stayed. You can not set 
limits to such knightly adventurers. After their own day 



Oct. 25] IDEALS OF COLLEGE 15 

is gone their spirits stalk the world, carrying inspiration 
everywhere that they go and reminding men of the lineage, 
the fine lineage, of those who have sought justice and right. 
It is no small matter, therefore, for a college to have as its 
patron saint a man who went out upon such a conquest. 
What I would like to ask you young people to-day is: How 
many of you have devoted yourselves to the like adventure? 
How many of you will volimteer to carry these spiritual 
messages of liberty to the world? How many of you will 
forego anything except your allegiance to that which is just 
and that which is right? We die but once, and we die with- 
out distinction if we are not willing to die the death of sac- 
rifice. Do you covet honor? You will never get it by 
serving yourself. Do you covet distinction? You will get 
it only as the serv^ant of mankind. Do not forget, then, as 
you walk these classic places, why you are here. You are 
not here merely to prepare to make a living. You are here 
in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater 
vision, -with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You 
are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if 
you forget the errand. 

It seems to me that there is no great difference between 
the ideals of the college and the ideals of the State. Can 
you not translate the one into the other? Men have not 
had to come to college, let me remind you, to quaff the 
fountains of this inspiration. You are merely more privi- 
leged than they. Men out of every walk of life, men with- 
out advantages of any kind, have seen the vision, and you, 
with it wTitten large upon every page of your studies, are the 
more blind if you do not see it when it is pointed out. You 
could not be forgiven for overlooking it. They might have 
been. But they did not await instruction. They simply 
drew the breath of life into their lungs, felt the aspirations 
that must come to every human soul, looked out upon their 
brothers, and felt their pulses beat as their fellows' beat, and 
then sought by counsel and action to move forward to com- 
mon ends that would be crowned with honor and achieve- 
ment. This is the only glory of America. Let every 
generation of Swarthmore men and women add to the 



1,3 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

strength of that lineage and the glory of that crown of 
life! 

White House Pamphlet. 

8. RELATIONS WITH LATIN AMERICA 

(October 27, 19 13) 

Address Before the Southern Commercial Congress 
AT Mobile 

It is with unaffected pleasure that I find myself here 
to-day. I once before had the pleasure, in cinother southern 
city, of addressing the Southern Commercial Congress. I 
then spoke of what the future seemed to hold in store for 
this region, which so many of us love and toward the future 
of which we all look forward with so much confidence and 
hope. But another theme directed me here this time. I do 
not need to speak of the South. She has, perhaps, acquired 
the gift of speaking for herself. I come because I want to 
speak of our present and prospective relations with our 
neighbors to the south. I deemed it a public duty, as well 
as a personal pleasure, to be here to express for myself and 
for the Government I represent the welcome w^e all feel to 
those who represent the Latin-American States. 

The future, ladies and gentlemen, is going to be very 
different for this hemisphere from the past. These States 
lying to the south of us, which have always been our neigh- 
bors, will now be drawn closer to us by innumerable ties, 
and, I hope, chief of all, by the tie of a common under- 
standing of each other. Interest does not tie nations to- 
gether; it sometimes separates them. But s>Tnpathy and 
understanding does unite them, and I believe that by the 
new route that is just about to be opened, while we phys- 
ically cut two continents asunder, we spiritually unite them. 
It is a spiritual union which we seek. 

I wonder if you realize, I wonder if your imaginations 
have been filled with the significance of the tides of com- 
merce. Your governor alluded in very fit and striking 



Ji 



Oct. 27] RELATIONS WITH LATIN AMERICA 17 

terms to the voyage of Columbus, but Columbus took his 
voyage under compulsion of circumstances. Constantinople 
had been captured by the Turks and all the routes of trade 
with the East had been suddenly closed. If there was not 
a v/ay across the Atlantic to open those routes again, they 
were closed forever; and Columbus set out not to discover 
America, for he did not know that it existed, but to discover 
the eastern shores of Asia. He set sail for Cathay and stum- 
bled upon America. With that change in the outlook of 
the world, what happened? England, that had been at the 
back of Europe with an unknown sea behind her, found that 
all things had turned as if upon a pivot and she was at the 
front of Europe; and since then all the tides of energy and 
enterprise that have issued out of Europe have seemed to be 
turned westward across the Atlantic. But you will notice 
that they have turned westward chiefly north of the Equator, 
and that it is the northern half of the globe that has seemed 
to be filled with the media of intercourse and of sympathy 
and of common understanding. 

Do you not see now wha^ is about to happen? These 
great tides which have been nmning along parallels of lati- 
tude will now swing southward athwart parallels of latitude, 
and that opening gate at the Isthmus of Panama will open 
the w^orld to a commerce that she has not known before, a 
commerce of intelligence, of thought and sympathy betw^een 
North and South. The Latin-American States which, to 
their disadvantage, have been off the main lines will now 
be on the main lines. I feel that these gentlemen honoring 
us with their presence to-day will presently find that some 
part, at any rate, of the center of gravity of the world has 
shifted. Do you realize that New York, for example, will 
be nearer the western coast of South America than she is 
now^ to the eastern coast of South America? Do you realize 
that a line drawn northw^ard parallel with the greater part 
of the w^estern coast of South America will run only about 
one hundred and fifty miles west of New" York? The great 
bulk of South America, if you will look at your globes (not 
at your Mercator's projection), lies eastward of the con- 
tinent of North America You will realize that when you 



i8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

realize that the canal will run southeast, not southwest, and 
that when you get into the Pacific you will be farther east 
than you were when you left the Gulf of Mexico. These 
things are significant, therefore, of this, that we are closing 
one chapter in the history of the world and are opening an- 
other of great, unimaginable significance. 

There is one peculiarity about the history of the Latin- 
American States which I am sure they are keenly aware of. 
You hear of "concessions" to foreign capitalists in Latin 
America. You do not hear of concessions to foreign capital- 
ists in the United States. They are not granted concessions. 
They are invited to make investments. The work is ours, 
though they are welcome to invest in it. We do not ask 
them to supply the capital and do the work. It is an invita- 
tion, not a privilege; and States that are obliged, because 
their territory does not lie within the main field of modem 
enterprise and action, to grant concessions are in this con- 
dition, that foreign interests are apt to dominate their do- 
mestic affairs, a condition of affairs always dangerous and 
apt to become intolerable. What these States are going to 
see, therefore, is an emancipation from the subordination, 
which has been inevitable, to foreign enterprise and an asser- 
tion of the splendid character which, in spite of these diffi- 
culties, they have again and again been able to demonstrate. 
The dignity, the courage, the self-possession, the self-respect 
of the Latin-American States, their achievements in the face 
of all these adverse circumstances, deser\'e nothing but the 
admiration and applause of the world. They have had 
harder bargains driven with them in the matter of loans than 
any other peoples in the world. Interest has been exacted' 
of them that was not exacted ot anybody else, because the 
risk was said to be greater; and then securities were taken 
that destroyed the risk — an admirable arrangement for those 
who were forcing the terms! I rejoice in nothing so much as 
in the prospect that they will now be emancipated from 
these conditions; and we ought to be the first to take part 
in assisting in that emancipation. I think some of these 
gentlemen have already had occasion to bear witness that 
the Department of State in recent months has tried to serve 



Oct. 27] RELATIONS WITH LATIN AMERICA 19 

them in that wise. In the future they will draw closer and 
closer to us because of circumstances of which I wish to 
speak with moderation and, I hope, without indiscretion. 

We must prove ourselves their friends and champions upon 
terms of equality and honor. You cannot be friends upon 
any other terms than upon the terms of equality. You 
cannot be friends at all except upon the terms of honor. 
We must show ourselves friends by comprehending their 
interest whether it squares with our OA^^l interest or not. It 
is a very perilous thing to determine the foreign policy of a 
nation in the terms of m.aterial interest. It not only is 
unfair to those with whom you are dealing, but it is degrad- 
ing as regards your own actions. 

Comprehension must be the soil in which shall grow all 
the fruits of friendship, and there is a reason and a com- 
pulsion lying behind all this which is dearer than anything 
else to the thoughtful men of America. I mean the develop- 
ment of constitutional liberty in the world. Human rights, 
national integrity, and opportunity as against material 
interests — that, ladies and gentlemen, is the issue which we 
now have to face. I want to take this occasion to say that ! 
the United States will never again seek one additional foot| 
of territory by conquest. She v/ill devote herself to showing \ 
that she knows how to make honorable and fruitful use of 
the territory she has, and she must regard it as one of the 
duties of friendship to see that from no quarter are material 
interests made superior to human liberty and national oppor- 
tunity. I say this, not with a single thought that anyone 
will gainsay it, but merely to fix in our consciousness what 
our real relationship with the rest of America is. It is the 
relationship of a family of mankind devoted to the develop- 
ment of true constitutional liberty. We know that that is 
the soil out of which the best enterprise springs. We know 
that this is a cause which Vv^e are making in common with 
our neighbors, because Vv-e have had to make it for ourselves. 
Reference has been made here to-day to some of the na- 
tional problems which confront us as a Nation. What is at 
the heart of all our national problems? It is that we have 
seen the hand of material interest sometimes about to close 



20 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1913 

upon our dearest rights and possessions. We have seen 
material interests threaten constitutional freedom in the 
United States. Therefore we will now know how to sympa- 
thize with those in the rest of America who have to contend 
with such powers, not only within their borders but from 
outside their borders also. 

I know what the response of the thought and heart of 
America will be to the program I have outlined, because 
America was created to realize a program like that. This 
is not America because it is rich. This is not America be- 
cause it has set up for a great population great opportuni- 
ties of material prosperity. America is a name which sounds 
in the ears of men everywhere as a synonjmi with individual 
opportunity because a synonym of individual liberty. I 
would rather belong to a poor nation that was free than to 
a rich nation that had ceased to be in love with liberty. But 
we shall not be poor if we love liberty, because the nation 
that loves liberty truly sets every man free to do his best 
and be his best, and that means the release of all the splendid 
energies of a great people who think for themselves. A 
nation of employees cannot be free any more than a nation 
of employers can be. 

In emphasizing the points which must unite us in sympathy 
and in spiritual interest with the Latin-American peoples we 
are only emphasizing the points of our own life, and we 
should prove ourselves untrue to our o\\ti traditions if we 
proved ourselves untrue friends to them. Do not think, 
therefore, gentlemen, that the questions of the day are mere 
questions of policy and diplomacy. They are shot through 
with the principles of life. We dare not turn from the 
principle that morality and not expediency is the thing that 
must guide us and that we will never condone iniquity be- 
cause it is most convenient to do so. It seems to me that 
this is a day of infinite hope, of confidence in a future greater 
than the past ha? been, for I am fain to believe that in spite 
of all the things that we wish to correct the nineteenth 
century that lies behind us has brought us a |ong stage 
toward the time when, slowly ascending the tedious climb 
that leads to the final uplands, we shall get our ultimate 






Oct. 2 7] RELATIONS WITH LATIN AMERICA 21 

view of the duties of mankind. We have breasted a con- 
siderable part of that climb and shall presently — it may be 
in a generation or two — come out upon those great heights 
where there shines unobstructed the light of the justice of 
God. 

Congressional Record, L, 5845. 



YEAR 1914 

9. REGULATION OF TRUSTS 

(January 20, 1914) 
Address to Congress 

In my report "on the state of the Union," which I had 
the privilege of reading to you on the 2d of December last, 
I ventured to reserve for discussion at a later date the sub- 
ject of additional legislation regarding the very difficult and 
intricate matter of trusts and monopolies. The time now 
seems opportune to turn to that great question; not only 
because the currency legislation, which absorbed your atten- 
tion and the attention of the country in December, is now 
disposed of, but also because opinion seems to be clearing 
about us with singular rapidity in this other great field of 
action. In the matter of the currency it cleared suddenly 
and very happily after the much-debated Act was passed; 
in respect of the monopolies which have multiplied about us 
and in regard to the various means by which they have been 
organized and maintained it seems to be coming to a clear 
and all but universal agreement in anticipation of our action, 
as if by way of preparation, mal-Jng the way easier to see 
and easier to set out upon with confidence and without con- 
fusion of counsel. * * * 

The great business men who organized and financed mo- 
nopoly and those who administered it in actual everyday 
transactions have year after year, until now, either denied 
its existence or justified it as necessary for the effective 
maintenance and development of the vast business processes 
of the country in the modem circumstances of trade and 

22 



Jan. 20] REGULATION OF TRUSTS 23 

manufacture and finance; but all the while opinion has made 
head against them. The average business man is con- 
vinced that the ways of liberty are also the ways of peace 
and the ways of success as well; and at last the masters of 
business on the great scale have begun to yield their prefer- 
ence and purpose, perhaps their judgment also, in honorable 
surrender. 

What we are purposing to do, therefore, is, happily, not to 
hamper or interfere with business as enlightened business 
men prefer to do it, or in any sense to put it under the ban. 
The antagonism between business and government is over.r 
We are now about to give expression to the best business 
judgment of America, to what we know to be the business! 
of conscience and honor of the land. The Government andt 
business men are ready to meet each other half way in a 
common effort to square business methods with both public 
opinion and the law. The best informed men of the business 
world condemn the methods and processes and consequences 
of monopoly as we condemn them; and the instinctive judg- 
ment of the vast majority of business men everywhere goes 
with them. We shall now be their spokesmen. That is the 
strength of our position and the sure prophecy of what will 
ensue when our reasonable work is done. 

When serious contest ends, when men unite in opinion and 
purpose, those who are to change their ways of business 
joining with those who ask for the change, it is possible to 
effect it in the way in which prudent and thoughtful and 
patriotic men would wish to see it brought about, with as 
few, as slight, as easy and simple business readjustments as 
possible in the circumstances, nothing essential disturbed, 
nothing torn up by the roots, no parts rent asunder which 
can be left in wholesome combination. Fortunately, no 
measures of sweeping or novel change are necessary. It 
will be understood that our object is not to unsettle busi- 
ness or anysvhere seriously to break its established courses 
athwart. On the contrary, we desire the laws we are now 
about to pass to be the bulwarks and safeguards of industry 
against the forces that have disturbed it. What we have to 
do can be done in a new spirit, in thoughtful moderation, 
without revolution of any untoward kind. 



24 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

; We are all agreed that "private monopoly is indefensible 

and intolerable," and our programme is founded upon that 

; conviction. It will be a comprehensive but not a radical or 

l unacceptable programme and these are its items, the changes 

which opinion deliberately sanctions and for which business 

waits: 

(It waits with acquiescence, in the first place, for laws 
which will effectually prohibit and prevent such interlock- 
ings of the personnel of the directorates of great corpora- 
tions — banks and railroads, industrial, commercial, and pub- 
. lie service bodies- — as in effect result in making those who 
borrow and those who lend practically one and the same, 
those who sell and those who buy but the same persons 
trading with one another under different names and in dif- 
ferent combinations, and those who affect to compete in fact 
partners and masters of some whole field of business. Suf- 
ficient time should be allowed, of course, in which to effect 
these changes of organization without inconvenience or 
confusion. 

Such a prohibition will work much more than a mere 
negative good by correcting the serious evils which have 
arisen because, for example, the men who have been the 
directing spirits of the great investment banks have usurped 
fhe place vrhich belongs to independent industrial manage- 
ment working in its own behoof. It will bring new m.en, 
new energies, a new spirit of initiative, new blood, into the 
management of our great business enterprises. It will open 
the field of industrial development and origination to scores 
of men who have been obliged to serve when their abilities 
entitled them to direct. It will immensely hearten the young 
men coming on and will greatly enrich the business activi- 
ties of the whole country. =5^ =5= * 

The business of the country awaits also, has long awaited 
and has suffered because it could not obtain, further and 
more explicit legislative definition of the policy and meaning 
of the existing antitrust lav;. Nothing hampers business like 
uncertainty. Nothing daunts or discourages it like the neces- 
sity to take chances, to run the risk of falling under the 
condemnation of the law before it can make sure just what 
the law is. Surely Vv-e are sufficiently familiar with the actual 



.in. 20] REGULATION OF TRUSTS 25 

processes and methods of monopoly and of the many hurtful 
restraints of trade to make definition possible, at any rate 
up to the limits of \Yhat experience has disclosed. These 
practices, being now abundantly disclosed, can be explicitly 
and item by item forbidden by statute in such terms as 
will practically eliminate uncertainty, the law itself and the 
penalty being made equally plain. 

And the business men of the country desire something more 
than that the menace of legal process in these m.atters be 
made explicit and intelligible. They desire the advice, the 
definite guidance and information which can be supplied by 
an administrative body, an interstate trade commission. 

The opinion of the country would instantly approve of 
such a com.mission. It would not wish to see it empowered 
to make terms ^\^th m.onopoly or in any sort to assume con- 
trol of business, as if the Government m.ade itself responsible. 
It demands such a commission only as an indispensable in- 
strument of information and publicity, as a clearing house for 
the facts by which both the public mind and the managers 
of great business undertakings should be guided, and as an 
instmmentality for doing justice to business where the proc- 
esses of the courts or the natural forces of correction outside 
the courts are inadequate to adjust the remedy to the wTong 
in a way that will meet all the equities and circumstances of 
the case. 

Producing industries, for example, which have passed the 
point up to which combination may be consistent with the 
public interest and the freedom of trade, can not always be 
dissected into their component units as readily as railroad 
companies or similar organizations can be. Their dissolution 
by ordinary legal process may often-times involve financial 
consequences likely to ovenvhelm the security market and 
bring upon it breakdoA^Ti and confusion. There ought to be 
an administrative commission capable of directing and shap- 
ing such corrective processes, not only in aid of the courts 
but also by independent suggestion, if necessar}^ 

Inasmuch as cur object and the spirit of our action in 
these matters is to meet business half way in its processes of 
self-correction and disturb its legitimate course as little as 
possible, we ought to see to it, and the judgmxent of practical 



2 6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

and sagacious men of affairs everywhere would applaud us 
if we did see it, that penalties and punishments should fall, 
not upon business itself, to its confusion and interruption, 
but upon the individuals who use the instrumentalities of 
business to do things which public policy and soimd business 
practice condemn. Every act of business is done at the com- 
, mand or upon the initiative of some ascertainable person 
I or group of persons. These should be held individually re- 
' sponsible and the punishment should fall upon them, not 
upon the business organization of which they make illegal 
use. It should be one of the main objects of our legislation 
to divest such persons of their corporate cloak and deal with 
them as with those who do not represent their corporations, 
but merely by deliberate intention break the law. Business 
men the country through would, I am sure, applaud us if 
we were to take effectual steps to see that the officers and 
directors of great business bodies were prevented from bring- 
ing them and the business of the country into disrepute and 
danger. 

Other questions remain which will need very thoughtful 
and practical treatment. Enterprises, in these modem days 
of great individual fortunes, are oftentimes interlocked, not 
by being under the control of the same directors, but by the 
fact that the greater part of their corporate stock is owned 
i by a single person or group of persons who are in some way 
1 intimately related in interest. We are agreed, I take it, that 
holding companies should be prohibited, but what of the 
controlling private ownership of individuals or actually co- 
operative groups of individuals? Shall the private owners 
of capital stock be suffered to be themselves in effect holding 
companies? We do not wish, I suppose, to forbid the pur- 
chase of stocks by any person who pleases to buy them in 
such quantities as he can afford, or in any way arbitrarily to 
limit the sale of stocks to bona fide purchasers. Shall we 
require the owners of stock, when their voting power in 
several companies which ought to be independent of one 
another would constitute actual control, to make election in 
which of them they will exercise their right to vote? This 
question I venture for your consideration. * * * 

I have laid the case before you, no doubt as it lies in your 



Jan. 20] REGULATION OF TRUSTS 27 

own mind, as it lies in the thought of the country. W^at 
must every candid man say of the suggestions I have laid 
before you, of the plain obligations of which I have reminded 
you? That these are new things for which the country is 
not prepared? No; but that they are old things, now fa- 
miliar, and must of course be undertaken if we are to square 
our laws with the thought and desire of the country. Until 
these things are done, conscientious business men the country 
over will be unsatisfied. They are in these things our men- 
tors and colleagues. We are now about to write the addi- 
tional articles of our constitution of peace, the peace that is 
honor and freedom and prosperity. 

White House Pamphlet. 

10. TOLLS ON THE PANAMA CANAL 

(March 5, 1914) 
Address to Congress 

I have come to you upon an errand which can be very 
briefly performed, but I beg that you will not measure its 
importance by the number of sentences in which I state it. 
No communication I have addressed to the Congress carried 
with it graver or more far-reaching implications as to the 
interest of the country, and I come now to speak upon a mat- 
ter with regard to which I am charged in a peculiar degree, 
by the Constitution itself, with personal responsibility. 

I have come to ask you for the repeal of that provision 
of the Panama Canal Act of August 24, 1912, which exempts 
vessels engaged in the coastv/ise trade of the United States 
from payment of tolls, and to urge upon you the justice, the 
wisdom, and the large policy of such a repeal with the ut- 
most earnestness of w^hich I am capable. 

In my own judgment, very fully considered and maturely 
formed, that exemption constitutes a mistaken economic 
policy from every point of view, and is, moreover, in plain 
contravention of the treaty with Great Britain concerning the 
canal concluded on November 18, 1901. But I have not 
come to urge upon yoa my personal views. I have come to 



28 ADDRESSES GF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

state to you a fact and a situation. Whatever may be our 
ovvn differences . of opinion concerning this much debated 
measure, its meaning is not debated outside the United 
States. Ever\'vvhere else the language of the treaty is given 
but one interpretation, and that interpretation precludes the 
exemption I am asking you to repeal. We consented to the 
treaty; its language we accepted, if we did not originate it; 
and we are too big, too powerful, too self-respecting a nation 
to interpret with a too strained or refined reading the words 
of our own promises just because we have power enough to 
give us leave to read them as we please. The large thing 
to do is the only thing w^e can afford to do, a voluntary with- 
drawal from a position everywhere questioned and misunder- 
stood. We ought to reverse our action without raising the 
question vrhether Ave were right or wrong, and so once more 
deserve our reputation for generosity and for the redemption 
of every obligation without quibble or hesitation. 

I ask this of you in support of the foreign policy of the 
administration. I shall not know how to deal with other mat- 
ters of even greater delicacy and nearer consequence if you 
do not grant it to me in ungrudging measure. 

White House Pamphlet. 



II. PATRIOTISM AND THE SAILOR ^ 

(May 16, 1914) j 

Address at the L^nveiling of the Statue of Commodore ^; 

John Barry ! 

I esteem it a privilege to be present on this interesting oc- ' 
casion, and I am very much tempted to anticipate some part ', 
of what the orators of the day will say about the character ' 
of the great man whose memory we celebrate. If I were to ! 
attempt an historical address, I might, however, be led too | 
far afield. I am going to take the liberty, therefore, of draw- 
ing a few inferences from the significance of this occa- ] 
sion. 

I think that we can never be present at a ceremony of ; 



May 1 6] PATRIOTISM AND THE SAILOR 29 

this kind, whicli carries our thought back to the great Revo- 
lution, by means of which our Government was set up, 
without feeling that it is an occasion of reminder," of re- 
newal, of refreshment, w^hen we turn our thoughts again to 
the great issues which were presented to the little Nation 
which then asserted its independence to the world; to which 
it spoke both in eloquent representations of its cause and in 
the sound of arms, and ask ourselves w^hat it was that these 
men fought for. No one can turn to the career of Commo- 
dore Barry without feeling a touch of the enthusiasm with 
which he devoted an originating mind to the great cause 
which he intended to serve, and it behooves us, living in this 
age w^hen no man can question the power of the Nation, w^hen 
no man w^ould dare to doubt its right and its determination 
to act for itself, to ask what it was that filled the hearts of 
these m.en when they set the Nation up. 

For patriotism, ladies and gentlemen, is in my mind not 
merely a sentiment. There is a certain effervescence, I sup- 
pose, w^hich ought to be permitted to those who allow their 
hearts to speak in the celebration of the glory and majesty 
of their country, but the country can have no glory and no 
majesty unless there be a deep principle and conviction back 
of the enthusiasm. Patriotism is a principle, not a m.ere sen- 
timent. No man can be a true patriot who does not feel 
himself shot through and through with a deep ardor for w^hat 
his country stands for, AA-hat its existence means, what its 
purpose is declared to be in its history and in its policy. I 
recall those solemn lines of the poet Tennyson in which he 
tries to give voice to his conception of what it is that stirs 
within a nation: "Some sense of duty, something of a faith, 
some reverence for the laws ourselves have made, some 
patient force to change them when we will, some civic man- 
hood firm against the crow'd;" steadfastness, clearness of 
purpose, courage, persistency, and that uprightness w^hich 
comes from the clear thinking of men w^ho wish to serve not 
themselves but their fellow men. 

WHiat does the United StRtes stand for, then, that our 
hearts should be stirred by the memory of the men w^ho set 
her Constitution up? John Barrv fought, like every other 
man in the Revolution, in order that America might be free 



30 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

to make her own life without interruption or disturbance from 
smy other quarter. You can sum the whole thing up in that, 
that America had a right to her own self-determined life; 
and what are our corollaries from that? You do not have 
to go back to stir your thoughts again \vith the issues of the 
Revolution. Some of the issues of the Revolution were not 
the cause of it, but merely the occasion for it. There are 
just as vital things stirring now that concern the existence of 
the Nation as were stirring then, and every man who worthily 
stands in this presence should examine himself and see 
whether he has the full conception of what it means that 
America should live her own life. Washington saw it when 
he wrote his farewell address. It was not merely because of 
passing and transient circumstances that Washington said 
that we must keep free from entangling alliances. It was 
because he saw that no country had yet set its face in the 
same direction in which America had set her face. We can 
not form alliances with those who are not going our way; 
and in our might and majesty and in the confidence and 
definiteness of our own purpose we need not and we should 
not form alliances with any nation in the world. Those 
who are right, those v/ho study their consciences in determin- 
ing their policies, those who hold their honor higher than 
their advantage, do not need alliances. You need alliances 
when you are not strong, and you are weak only when you 
are not true to yourself. You are weak only when you are 
in the wrong; you are weak only when you are afraid to do 
the right ; you are weak only when you doubt your cause and 
the majesty of a nation's might asserted. 

There is another corollary. John Barry was an Irishman, 
but his heart crossed the Atlantic with him. He did not 
leave it in Ireland. And the test of all of us — for all of us 
had our origins on tlie other side of the sea — is whether we 
will assist in enabling America to live her separate and in- 
dependent life, retaining our ancient affections, indeed, but 
determining everything that we do by the interests that exist 
on this side of the sea. Some Americans need hyphens in 
their names, because only part of them has come over; but 
when the whole man has come over, heart and thought and 
all, the hyphen drops of its own weight out of his name. 



May i6] PATRIOTISM AND THE SAILOR 31 

This man was not an Irish-American; he was an Irishman 
who became an American. I venture to say if he voted he 
voted with regard to the questions as they looked on this side 
of the water and not as they affected the other side; 
and that is my infalHble test of a genuine American, 
that when he votes or when he acts or when he fights 
his heart and his thought are centered nowhere but in the 
emotions and the purposes and the policies of the United 
States. 

This man illustrates for me all the splendid strength which 
we brought into this country by the magnet of freedom. 
Men have been drawn to this country by the same thing that 
has made us love this country — by the opportunity to live 
their own lives and to think their own thoughts and to let 
their whole natures expand with the expansion of a free and 
mighty Nation. We have brought out of the stocks of all 
the world all the best impulses and have appropriated them 
and Americanized them and translated them into the glory 
and majesty of a great country. 

So, ladies and gentlemen, when we go out from this pres- 
ence we ought to take this idea with us that we, too, are 
devoted to the purpose of enabling America to live her own 
life, to be the justest, the most progressive, the most honor- 
able, the most enlightened Nation in the world. Any man 
that touches our honor is our enemy. Any man w^o stands 
in the way of the kind of progress which makes for human 
freedom can not call himself our friend. Any man who does 
not feel behind him the whole push and rush and compul- 
sion that filled men's hearts in the time of the Revolution 
is no American. No man who thinks first of himself and 
afterwards of his country can call himself an American. 
America must be enriched by us. We must not live upon 
her; she must live by means of us. 

I, for one, come to this shrine to renew the impulses of 
American democracy. I would be ashamed of myself if I 
went away from this place \^^thout realizing again that every 
bit of selfishness must be purged from our policy, that e\'ery 
bit of self-seeking must be purged from our individual con- 
sciences, cmd that we must be great, if we would be great at 
all, in the light and illumination of the example of men who 



32 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

gave everything that they were and everything that they had 
to the glory and honor of America. 

White House Pamphlet. 



12. THE MEN WHO FOUGHT FOR THE UNION 

(May 30, 1914) 

Memorial Day Address at Arlington 

I have not come here to-day with a prepared address. 
The committee in charge of the exercises of the day have 
graciously excused me on the grounds of public obligations 
from preparing such an address, but I will not deny myself 
the privilege of joining with you in an expression of grati- 
tude and admiration for the men who perished for the sake 
of the Union. They do not need our praise. They do not 
need tliat our admiration should sustain them. There is 
no immortality that is safer than theirs. We come not for 
their sakes but for our own, in order that we may drink at 
the same springs of inspiration from which they themselves 
drank. 

A peculiar privilege came to the men who fought for the 
Union. There is no other civil war in history, ladies and 
gentlemen, the stings of which vrere removed before the men 
who did the fighting passed from the stage of life. So that 
we owe these men something more than a legal reestablish- 
ment of the Union. W^e owe them the spiritual reestablish- 
ment of the Union as well ; for they not only reunited States, 
they reunited the spirits of men. That is their unique 
achievement, unexampled an\^vhere else in the annals of man- 
kind, that the very men whom they overcame in battle join 
in praise and gratitude that the Union was saved. There is 
something peculiarly beautiful and peculiarly touching about 
that. \\l^ene\Tr a man who is still trying to devote himself 
to the service of the Nation comes into a presence like this. 
or into a place like this, his spirit must be peculiarly moved. 
A mandate is laid upon him which seems to speak from the 



May 30] MEN WHO FOUGHT FOR THE UNION 33 

very graves tliemselves. Those who serve this Nation, 
whether iPx peace or in war, should serve it without thought 
of themselves. I can never speak in praise of war, ladies and 
gentlemen; you would not desire me to do so. But there is 
this peculiar distinction belonging to the soldier, tiiat he goes 
into an enterprise out of which he himself can not get any- 
thing at all. He is giving everything that he hath, even his 
life, in order that others may live, not in order that he him- 
self may obtain gain and prosperity. And just so soon as 
the tasks of peace are performed in the same spirit of self- 
sacrifice and devotion, peace societies will not be necessary. 
The very organization and spirit of society will be a guar- 
anty of peace. 

Therefore this peculiar thing comes about, that we can 
stand here and praise the m.emory of these soldiers in the 
interest of peace. They set us the exam^ple of self-sacrifice, 
which if followed in peace will make it unnecessary that 
men should follow war any more. 

We are reputed to be somewhat careless in our discrimina- 
tion between words in the use of the English language, and 
yet it is interesting to note that there are some words about 
which we are very careful. We bestow the adjective "great'' 
somewhat indiscriminately. A man who has made conquest 
of his fellow men for his ov/n gain may display such genius 
in war, such uncommion qualities of organization and leader- 
ship that we may call him "great," but there is a word which 
we reser\^e for m.en of another kind and about which we are 
very careful; that is the word "noble." We never call a man 
"noble" v:ho serves only himself; and if you will look about 
through all the nations of the world upon the statues that 
men have erected — upon the inscribed tablets where they 
have wished to keep alive the memory of the citizens whom 
they desire most to honor — you v;ill find that almost with- 
out exception they have erected the statue to those who had 
a splendid surplus of energy and devotion to spend upon 
their fellow men. Nobility exists in America without patent. 
We have no House of Lords, but we have a house of fame 
to which we elevate those who are the noble men of our 
race, who, forgetful of themselves, study and sen^e the pub- 



34 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

lie interest, who have the courage to face any number and 
any kind of adversary, to speak what in their hearts they 
believe to be the truth. 

We admire physical courage, but we admire above all 
things else moral courage. I believe that soldiers will bear 
me out in saying that both come in time of battle. I take it 
that the moral courage comes in going in the battle, and the 
physical courage in staying in. There are battles which are 
just as hard to go into and just as hard to stay in as the 
battles of arms, and if the man will but stay and think never 
of himself there will come a time of grateful recollection when 
men will speak of him not only with admiration but with that 
which goes deeper, with affection and with reverence. 

So that this flag calls upon us daily for service, and the 
more quiet and self-denying the service the greater the glory 
of the flag. We are dedicated to freedom, and that freedom 
means the freedom of the human spirit. All free spirits 
ought to congregate on an occasion like this to do homage to 
the greatness of America as illustrated by the greatness of 
her sons. 

It has been a privilege, ladies and gentlemen, to come and 
say these simple words, which I am sure are merely putting 
your thought into language. I thank you for the opportunity 
to lay this little wreath of mine upon these consecrated 
graves. 

White House Pamphlet. 



13. UNION OF SPIRIT BETWEEN NORTH 
AND SOUTH 

(June 4, 1914) 

Address at a Monument in Memory of the Confed- 
erate Dead at Arlington 

I assure you that I am profoundly aware of the solemn 
significance of the thing that has now taken place. The 
Daughters of the Confederacy have presented a memorial 
of their dead to iht Government of the United States. I 



June 4] UNION OF NORTH AND SOUTH 35 

hope that you have noted the history of the conception of 
this idea. It was suggested by a President of the United 
States who had himself been a distinguished officer in the 
Union Army. It was authorized by an act of Congress of 
the United States. The comer stone of the monument was 
laid by a President of the United States elevated to his posi- 
tion by the votes of the party w^ich had chiefly prided itself 
upon sustaining the war for the Union, and who, w^hile Sec- 
retary of War, had himself given authority to erect it. And, 
now, it has fallen to my lot to accept in the name of the 
great Government, which I am privileged for the time to rep- 
resent, this emblem of a reunited people. I am not so much 
happy as proud to participate in this capacity on such an oc- 
casion, — proud that I should represent such a people. Am 
I mistaken, ladies and gentlemen, in supposing that nothing 
of this sort could have occurred in anything but a democ- 
racy? The people of a democracy are not related to their 
rulers as subjects are related to a government. They are 
themselves the sovereign authority, and as they are neighbors 
of each other, quickened by the same influences and moved 
by the same motives, they can understand each other. They 
are shot through with some of the deepest and profoundest 
instincts of human sympathy. They choose their govern- 
ments; they select their rulers; they live their own life, and 
they will not have that life disturbed and discolored by fra- 
ternal misunderstandings. I know that a reuniting of spirits 
like this can take place more quckly in our time than in any 
other because men are now united by an easier transmission 
of those influences which make up the foundations of peace 
and of mutual understanding, but no process can work these 
effects unless there is a conducting medium. The conduct- 
ing medium in this instance is the united heart of a great 
iDeople. I am not going to detain you by trying to repeat 
any of the eloquent thoughts which have moved us this after- 
noon, for I rejoice in the simplicity of the task which is 
assigned to me. My privilege is this, ladies and gentlemen: 
To declare this chapter in the history of the United States 
closed and ended, and I bid you turn with me with your faces 
to the future, quickened by the memories of the past, but 
with nothing to do with the contests of the past, knowing, 



36 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

as we have shed our blood upon opposite sides, we now face 
and admire one another. I do not know how many years ago 
it was that the Century Dictionary was pubUshed, but I 
remember one day in the Century Cyclopedia of Names I 
had occasion to turn to the name of Robert E. Lee, and I 
found him there in that book published in New York City 
simply described as a great American general. The generos- 
ity of our judgments did not begin to-day. The generosity 
of our judgment was made up soon after this great struggle 
was over. Men came and sat together again in the Con- 
gress and united in all the efforts of peace and of govern- 
ment, and our solemn duty is to see that each one of us is 
in his own consciousness and in his own conduct a replica of 
this great reunited people. It is our duty and our privilege 
to be like the country we represent and, speaking no word of 
malice, no word of criticism even, stand shoulder to shoulder 
to lift the burdens of mankind in the future and show the 
paths of freedom to all the w'orld. 

White House Pamphlet. 



14. THE NAVAL SERVICE 

(June 5, 1914) 

Address at the Naval Academy, Annapolis 

During the greater part of my life I have been associated 
with young men, and on occasions it seems to me without 
number have faced bodies of youngsters going out to take 
part in the activities of the v/orld, but I have a consciousness 
of a different significance in this occasion from that which I 
have felt on ether similar occasions. "Wlien I have faced tlie 
graduating classes at universities I have felt that I was facing 
a great conjecture. They were going out into all sorts of pur- 
suits and with every degree of preparation for the particular 
thing they were expecting to do; some without any prepara- 
tion at all, for they did not know what the\^ expected to do. 
But in facing you I am facing men v/ho are trained for a 
sp>ecial thing. You know what you are going to do, and you 



June 5] THE NAVAL SERVICE 37 

are under the eye of the whole Nation in doinfr it. For you, 
gentlemen, are to be part of the power of the Government of 
the United States. There is a very deep and solemn signifi- 
cance in that fact, and I am sure that every one of you feels 
it. The moral is perfectly obvious. Be ready and fit for 
anything that you have to do. And keep ready and fit. 
Do not grow slack. Do not suppose that your education is 
over because you have received your diplomas from the 
academy. Your education has just begun. jNIoreover, you 
are to have a very peculiar privilege which not many of your 
predecessors have had. You are yourselves going to become 
teachers. You are going to teach those 50,000 fellow coun- 
trymen of yours who are the enlisted men of the Navy. You 
are going to make them fitter to obey your orders and to 
serve the country. You are going to make them fitter to see 
what the orders mean in their outlook upon life and upon the 
service; and that is a great privilege, for out of you is going 
the energy and intelligence which are going to quicken the 
whole body of the United States Navy. * * * 

It ought to be one of your thoughts all the time that you 
are sample Americans — not merely sample Navy men, not 
merely sample soldiers, but sample Americans — and that you 
have the point of view of America with regard to her Navy 
and her Army; that she is using them as the instruments of 
civilization, not as the instruments of aggression. The idea 
of America is to serve humanity, and every time you let the 
Stars and Stripes free to the wind you ought to realize that 
that is in itself a message that you are on an errand Vv'hich 
other navies have sometimes forgotten; not an errand of 
conquest, but an errand of service. I always have the same 
thought when I look at the flag of the United States, for I 
know som.ething of the history of the struggle of mankind _ 
for liberty. When I look at that flag it seems to me as if the', 
white stripes were strips of parchm.ent upon which are writ-| 
ten the rights of man, and the red stripes the streams 01 
blood by vrhich those rights have been made good. Then in 
the little blue firmament in the corner have swung out the 
stars of the States of the Am.erican Union. So, it is, as it 
were, a sort of floating charter that has come down to us 
from Runnymede, when men said, "We will not have mas- 



38 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

ters; we will be a people, and we vnll seek our own liberty." 
You are not serving a government, gentlemen; you are 
serving a people. For we who for the time being constitute 
the Government are merely instruments for a little while in 
the hands of a great Nation which chooses whom it will to 
carry out its decrees and who invariably rejects the man who 
forgets the ideals which it intended him to serve. So that I 
hope that wherever you go you will have a generous, compre- 
hending love of the people you come into contact with,'^d 
will come back and tell us, if you can, what service the 
United States can render to the remotest parts of the world; 
tell us where you see men suffering; tell us w^here you think 
advice will lift them up; tell us where you think that the 
counsel of statesmen may better the fortunes of unfortunate 
men; ahvays having it in mind that you are champions of 
what is right and fair all 'round for the public welfare, no 
matter where you are, and that it is that you are ready to 
fight for and not merely on the drop of a hat or upon some 
slight punctillio, but that you are champions of your fellow 
men, particularly of that great body one hundred million 
strong whom you represent in the United States. * * * 

I challenge you youngsters to go out with these concep- 
tions, knowing that you are part of the Government and 
force of the United States and that men will judge us by 
you. I am not afraid of the verdict. I can not look in your 
faces and doubt what it will be, but I want you to take 
these great engines of force out onto the seas like adven- 
turers enlisted for the elevation of the spirit of the human 
race. For that is the only distinction that America has. 
Other nations have been strong, other nations have piled 
wealth as high as the sky, but they have come into disgrace 
because they used their force and their wealth for the op- 
pression of mankind and their own aggrandizement; and 
America v;ill not bring glory to herself, but disgrace, by fol- 
lowing the beaten paths of history. We must strike out upon 
new paths, and we must count upon you gentlemen to be the 
explorers who will carry this spirit and spread this message 
all over the seas and in every part of the civilized world. 

You see, therefore, why I said that when I faced you I 
felt there was .a special significance. I am not present on an 



June 5] THE NAVAL SERVICE 39 

occasion when you are about to scatter on various errands. 
You are all going on the same errand, and I like to feel bound 
with you in one common organization for the glory of Amer- 
ica. And her glory goes deeper than all the tinsel, goes 
deeper than the sound of guns and the clash of sabers; it 
goes down to the very foundation of those things that have 
made the spirit of men free and happy and content. 

White House Pamphlet, 

15. AMERICA AS A WORLD POWER 

(July 4, 1914) 
Address at Independence Hall, Philadelphla 

* * * In one sense the Declaration of Independence has 
lost its significance. It has lost its significance as a declara- 
tion of national independence. Nobody outside of America 
believed when it was uttered that we could make good our 
independence; now nobody anywhere would dare to doubt 
that we are independent and can maintain our independence. 
As a declaration of independence, therefore, it is a mere his- 
toric document. Our independence is a fact so stupendous 
that it can be measured only by the size and energy and 
variety and wealth and p)ower of one of the greatest nations 
in the world. But it is one thing to be independent and it is 
another thing to know what to do with your independence. 
It is one thing to come to your majority and another thing to 
know what you are going to do with your life and your ener- 
gies; and one of the most serious questions for sober-minded 
men to address themselves to in the United States is this: 
WTiat are v;e going to do with the influence and power of this 
great Nation? Are we going to play the old role of using 
that power for our aggrandizement and material benefit 
only? You know what that may mean. It may upon occa- 
sion mean that we shall use it to make the peoples of other 
nations suffer in the way in which we said it was intolerable 
to suffer when we uttered our Declaration of Independence. 

The Department of State at Washington is constantly 
called upon to back up the commercial enterprises and the 



40 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

industrial enterprises of the United States in foreign coun- 
tries, and it at one time went so far in that direction that 
all its diplomacy came to be designated as "dollar di- 
plomacy." It was called upon to support every m.an w^ho 
w^anted to earn anything anywhere if he was an American. 
But there ought to be a limit to that. There is no m.an w^ho 
is more interested than I am in carrying the enterprise of 
American business men to every quarter of the globe. I was 
interested in it long before I v;as suspected of being a poli- 
tician. I have been preaching it year after year as the great 
thing that lay in the future for the United States, to show her 
wit and skill and enterprise and influence in every country 
in the world. But observe the limit to all that which is laid 
upon us perh?ps more than upon any other nation in the 
world. We set this Nation up, at any rate we professed to 
set it up. to vindicate the rights of men. We did not name 
any differences between one race and another. We did not 
set up any barriers against any particular people. We 
opened our gates to all the world and said, "Let all men who 
wish to be free come to us and they will be welcome." We 
said, "This independence of ours is not a selfish thing for 
our own exclusive private use. It is for everybody to whom 
we can find the m.eans of extending it." We can not with 
that oath taken in our youth, we can not with that great ideal 
set before us when we were a young people and numbered 
only a scant 3,000,000, take upon ourselves, now that we are 
100,000.000 strong, any other conception of duty than we 
then entertained. If American enterprise in foreign countries, 
particularly in those foreign countries which are not strong 
enough to resist us, takes the shape of imposing upon and 
exploiting the mass of the people of that country it ought to 
be checked and not encouraged. I am willing to get anything 
for an American that money and enterprise can obtain except 
the suppression of the rights of other men. I ^^^ll not help 
an3^ man buy a power which he ought not to exercise over his 
fellow beings. 

You know, my fellow countrymen, what a big question 
there is in Mexico. Eighty-five per cent of the Mexican 
people have never been allowed to have any genuine partici- 
pation in their own Government or to exercise any substan- 



July 4] AMERICA AS A WORLD POWER 41 

tial rights with regard to the very land they live upon. All 
the rights that men most desire have been exercised by the 
other 15 per cent. Do you suppose that that circumstance is 
not sometimes in my thought? I know that the American 
people have a heart that will beat just as stroncr for those 
millions in Mexico as it will beat, or has beaten, for any 
other millions elsewhere in the v/orld, and that when once 
they conceive what is at stake in Mexico they will know what 
ought to be done in Mexico. I hear a great deal said about 
the loss of property in Mexico and the loss of the lives of 
foreigners, and I deplore these things with all my heart. 
Undoubtedly, upon the conclusion of the present disturbed 
conditions in Mexico those who have been unjustly deprived 
of their property or in any wise unjustly put upon ought to 
be compensated. Men's individual rights have no doubt been 
invaded, and the invasion of those rights has been attended 
*by many deplorable circumstances which ought sometime, 
in the proper way, be accounted for. But back of it all is the 
struggle of a people to come into its ovv-n, and while we look 
upon the incidents in the foreground let us net forget the 
great tragic reality in the background which towers above the 
whole picture. 

A patriotic American is a man vrho is not niggardly and 
selfish in the things that he enjoys that make for human lib- 
erty and the rights of man. He wants to share them, wnth 
the whole world, and he is never so proud of the great flag 
under which he lives as when it comes to mean to other 
people as n-ell as to himself a symbol of hope and liberty. ' I 
would be ashamed of this flag if it ever did anything outside 
America that we would not permit it to do inside of America. 

The world is becoming more complicated ever\' da}^, my 
fellow citizens. No man ought to be foolish enough to think 
that he understands it all. And, therefore, I am glad that 
there are some simple things in the world. One of the simple 
things is principle. Honesty is a perfectly simple thing. It 
is hard for me to believe that in most circumstances when a 
man has a choice of vrays he does not know which is the right 
way and vrhich is the wrong way. No man who has chosen 
the wrong way ought even to com.e into Independence 
Square; it is holy ground which he ought not to tread upon. 



42 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

He ought not to come where immortal voices have uttered 
the great sentences of such a document as this Declaration 
of Independence upon which rests the liberty of a w^hole 
nation. 

And so I say that it is patriotic sometimes to prefer the 
honor of the country to its material interest. Would you 
rather be deemed by all the nations of the world incapable 
of keeping your treaty obligations in order that you might 
have free tolls for American ships? The treaty under which 
we gave up that right may have been a mistaken treaty, but 
there was no mistake about its meaning. 

When I have made a promise as a man I try to keep it, 
and I know of no other rule permissible to a nation. The 
most distinguished nation in the world is the nation that can 
and will keep its promises even to its own hurt. And I want 
to say parenthetically that I do not think anybody was hurt. 
I can not be enthusiastic for subsidies to a monopoly, but 
let those who are enthusiastic for subsidies ask themselves 
whether they prefer subsidies to unsullied honor. 

The most patriotic man, ladies and gentlemen, is sometimes 
the man who goes in the direction that he thinks right even 
when he sees half the world against him. It is the dictate of 
patriotism to sacrifice yourself if you think that that is the 
path of honor and of duty. Do not blame others if they do 
not agree with you. Do not die with bitterness in your heart 
because you did not convince the rest of the w^orld, but die 
happy because you believe that you tried to serve your coun- 
try by not selling your soul. Those were grim days, the days 
of 1776. Those gentlemen did not attach their names to 
the Declaration of Independence on this table expecting a 
holiday on the next day, and that 4th of July was not itself 
a holiday. They attached their signatures to that significant 
document knowing that if they failed it was certain that 
every one of them would hang for the failure. They were 
committing treason in the interest of the liberty of 3,000,000 
people in America. All the rest of the world was against them 
and smiled with cynical incredulity at the audacious under- 
taking. Do you think that if they could see this great Nation 
now they would regret anything that they then did to draw 
the gaze of a hostile world upon them? Every idea must be 



July 4] AMERICA AS A WORLD POWER 43 

started by somebody, and it is a lonely thing to start any- 
thing. Yet if it is in you, you must start it if you have a 
man's blood in you and if you love the country that you pro- 
fess to be working for. 

I am sometimes very much interested when I see gentlemen 
supposing that popularity is the way to success in America. 
The way to success in this great country, with its fair jud'g- 
ments, is to show that you are not afraid of anybody except 
God and his final verdict. If I did not believe that, I would 
not believe in democracy. If I did not believe that, I would 
not believe that people can govern themselves. If I did not 
believe that the moral judgment would be the last judgment, 
the final judgment, in the minds of men as wtII as the tri- 
bunal of God, I could not believe in popular government. 
But I do believe these things, and, therefore, I earnestly 
believe in the democracy not only of America but of every 
awakened people that wishes and intends to govern and con- 
trol its ovm. affairs. 

It is very inspiring, my friends, to come to this that may 
be called the original fountain of independence and liberty 
in America and here drink draughts of patriotic feeling which 
seem to renew the very blood in one's veins. Dowti in Wash- 
ington sometimes when the days are hot and the business 
presses intolerably and there are so many things to do that 
it does not seem possible to do anything in the way it ought 
to be done, it is always possible to lift one's thoughts above 
the task of the m.oment and, as it were, to realize that great 
thing of v/hich we are all parts, the great body of American 
feeling and American principle. No man could do the work 
that has to be done in Washington if he allowed himself to 
be separated from that body of principle. He must make 
himself feel that he is a part of the people of the United 
States, that he is trying to think not only for them, but with 
them, and then he can not feel lonely. He not only can 
not feel lonely but he can not feel afraid of anything. 

iNIy dream is that as the years go on and the world knows 
more and more of America it will also drink at these foun- 
tains of youth and renewal ; that it also will turn to America 
for those moral inspirations which lie at the basis of all free- 
dom; that the world will never fear America unless it feels 



44 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

that it is engaged in some enterprise which is inconsistent 
with the rights of humanity; and that America will come 
into the full light of the day when all shall know that she 
puts human rights above all other rights and that her flag 
is the flag not only of America but of humanity. 

What other great people has devoted itself to this exalted 
ideal? To what other nation in the world can all eyes look 
for an instant s}Tnpathy that thrills the whole body politic 
when men anywhere are fighting for their rights? I do not 
know that there will ever be a declaration of independence 
and of grievances for mankind, but I believe that if any such 
document is ever drawn it will be drawn in the spirit of the 
American Declaration of Independence, and that America has 
lifted high the light which will shine unto all generations and 
guide the feet of mankind to the goal of justice and liberty 
and peace. 

White House Pamphlet. 



16. NEUTRALITY OF FEELING 

(August 18, 1914) 
A Presidential Proclamation 

I suppose that every thoughtful man in America has asked 
himself, during these last troubled weeks, what influence the 
European war may exert upon the United States, and I take 
the liberty of addressing a few words to you in order to point 
out that it is entirely within our o\\r\ choice what its effects 
upon us mil be and to urge ver}^ earnestly upon you the sort 
of speech and conduct which will best safeguard the Nation 
against distress and disaster. 

The effect of the war upon the United States will depend 
upon what American citizens say and do. Every man who 
really loves America will act and speak in the true spirit of 
neutrality, which is the spirit of impartiality and fairness and 
friendliness to all concerned. The spirit of the Nation in this 



i 



Aug. i8] NEUTRALITY OF FEELING 45 

critical matter will be determined largely by what individuals 
and society and those gathered in public meetings do and 
say, upon what newspapers and magazines contain, upon 
what ministers utter in their pulpits, and men proclaim as 
their opinions on the street. 

The people of the United States are drawn from many 
nations, and chiefly from the nations now at war. It is 
natural and inevitable that there should be the utmost variety 
of sympathy and desire among them with regard to the issues 
and circumstances of the conflict. Some will wish one nation, 
others another, to succeed in the momentous struggle. It 
will be easy to excite passion and difficult to allay it. Those 
responsible for exciting it will assume a heavy responsibility, 
responsibility for no less a thing than that the people of the 
United States, whose love of their country and whose loyalty 
to its Government should unite them as Americans all, bound 
in honor and affection to think first of her and her interests, 
may be divided in camps of hostile opinion, hot against each 
other, involved in the war itself in impulse and opinion if 
not in action. 

Such divisions among us would be fatal to our peace of 
mind and might seriously stand in the way of the proper 
performance of our duty as the one great nation at peace, 
the one people holding itself ready to play a part of impar- 
tial mediation and speak the counsels of peace and accommo- 
dation, not as a partisan, but as a friend. 

I venture, therefore, my fellow countrymen, to speak a 
solemn word of warning to you against that deepest, most 
subtle, most essential breach of neutrality which may spring 
out of partisanship, out of passionately taking sides. The I 
United States must be neutral in fact as well as in name dur-l 
ing these days that are to try men's souls. We must be 
impartial in thought as well as in action, must put a curb 
upon our sentiments as well as upon every transaction that 
might be construed as a preference of one party to the strug- ^ 
gle before another. 

My thought is of America. I am speaking, I feel sure, 
the earnest wish and purpose of every thoughtful American 
that this great country of ours, which is, of course, the first 
in our thoughts and in our hearts, should show herself in this 



ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

jme of peculiar trial a Nation fit beyond others to exhibit 
the fine poise of undisturbed judgment, the dignity of self- 
control, the efficiency of dispassionate action; a Nation that 
neither sits in judgment upon others nor is disturbed in her 
own counsels and which keeps herself fit and free to do what 
is honest and disinterested and truly serviceable for the peace 
of the world. 

Shall we not resolve to put upon ourselves the restraints 
which will bring to our people the happiness and the great and 
lasting influence for peace we covet for them? 

Department of State, White Book, No. II, 17. 



17. INTERNATIONAL AND MUNICIPAL LAW , 

(October 20, 19 14) , 

I 
Address before the American Bar Association ; 

* * * We stand now in a peculiar case. Our first thought, i 

I suppose, as lawyers, is of international law, of those bonds j 
of right and principle which draw the nations together and 

hold the community of the world to some standards of ac- I 

tion. We know that we see in international law, as it were, j 
the moral processes by which law itself came into existence. 

I know that as a lawyer I have myself at times felt that there i 

was no real comparison between the law of a nation and the 1 

law of nations, because the latter lacked the sanction that • 

gave the former strength and validity. And yet, if you look - 

into the matter more closely, you vvill find that the two have ; 

the same foundations, and that those foundations are more i 

evident and conspicuous in our day than they have ever been j 
before. 

The opinion of the world .is the mistress of the world: 

and the processes of international law are the slow procesf^cs ] 

by which opinion works its ^vill. WTiat impresses me is the ; 
constant thought that that is the tribunal at the bar of which 

J 



Oct. 20] INTERNATIONAL AND MUNICIPAL LAW 47 

we all sit. I would call your attention, incidentally, to the 
circumstance that it does not observe the ordinary rules of 
evidence; which has sometimes suggested to me that the or- 
dinary rules of evidence had shown some signs of growing 
antique. Everything, rumor included, is heard in this court, 
and the standard of judgment is not so much the character 
of the testimony as the character of the witness. The mo- 
tives are disclosed, the purposes are conjectured, and that 
opinion is finally accepted which seems to be, not the best 
founded in law, perhaps, but the best founded in integrity of 
character and of morals. That is the process which is slowly 
working its v;ill upon the world; and what we should be 
watchful of is not so much jealous interests as sound prin- 
ciples of action. The disinterested course is always the big- 
gest course to pursue not only, but it is in the long run the 
most profitable course to pursue. If you can establish your 
character, you can establish your credit. 

What I wanted to suggest to this association, in bidding 
them very hearty welcome to the city, is whether we suf- 
ficiently apply these same ideas to the body of municipal law 
which we seek to administer. Citations seem to play so much 
larger a role now than principle. There was a time when 
the thoughtful eye of the judge rested upon the changes of 
social circumstances and almost palpably saw the law arise 
out of human life. Have we got to a time when the only 
way to change law is by statute? The changing of law by 
statute seems to me like mending a garment with a patch, 
whereas law should grow by the life that is in it, not by the 
life that is outside of it. 

I once said to a lawyer with whom I was discussing some 
question of precedent, and in whose presence I was ventur- 
ing to doubt the rational validity, at any rate, of the particu- 
lar precedents he cited, "After all, isn't our object justice?" 
And he said, "God forbid! We should be very much con- 
fused if we made that our standard. Our standard is to find 
out what the rule has been and how the rule that has been 
applies to the case that is." I should hate to think that 
the law was based entirely upon "has beens." I should hate 
to tliink that the law did not derive its impulse from looking 
forward rather than from looking backward, or, rather, that 



48 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

it did not derive its instruction from looking about and seeing 
what the circumstances of man actually are and what the 
impulses of justice necessarily are. 

Understand me, gentlemen, I am not venturing in this 
presence to impeach the law. For the present, by the force 
of circumstances, I am in part the em.bodiment of the law, and 
it would be very awkward to disavow^ myself. But I do wish 
to make this intimation, that in this time of world change, in 
this time when we are going to find out just how, in what 
particulars, and to what extent the real facts of human life 
and the real moral judgments of mankind prevail, it is worth 
while looking inside our municipal law and seeing whether the 
judgments of the law are made square with the moral judg- 
ments of mankind. For I believe that we are custodians, 
not of commands, but of a spirit. We are custodians of the 
spirit of righteousness, of the spirit of equal-handed justice, 
of the spirit of hope which believes in the perfectibility of the 
law with the perfectibility of human life itself. 

Public life, like private life, would be very dull and dry if 
it were not for this belief in the essential beauty of the human 
spirit and the belief that the human spirit could be translated 
into action and into ordinance. Not entire. You can not go 
any faster than you can advance the average m.oral judg- 
ments of the mass, but you can go at least as fast as that, 
and you can see to it that you do not lag behind the average 
moral judgments of the mass. I have in my life dealt with. 
all sorts and conditions of men, and I have found that the 
flame of moral judgment burned just as bright in the man of 
humble life and limited experience as in the scholar and the 
man of affairs. And I would like his voice always to be 
heard, not as a witness, not as speaking in his own case, but 
as if he were the voice of men in general, in our courts of 
justice, as well as the voice of the lawyers, remembering what 
the law has been. My hope is that, being stirred to the 
depths by the extraordinary circumstances of the time in 
which we live, we may recover from those depths something 
of a renew^aJ of that vision of the law with which men may be 
supposed to have started out in the old days of the oracles, 
who communed with the intimations of divinity. 

White House Pamphlet. 



J 



Oct. 24] YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION 49 

18. THE YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN 
ASSOCIATION 

(October 24, 19 14) 

Address Before the American Bar Association 

* * * I am interested in [this organization] * * * fQj- 
various reasons. First of all, because it is an association for 
young men. I have had a good deal to do with young men 
in my time, and I have formed an impression of them which 
I believe to be contrary to the general impression. They are 
generally thought to be arch radicals. As a matter of fact, 
they are the most conservative people I have ever dealt ^Yith. 
Go to a college community and try to change the least cus- 
tom of that little world and find how the conservatives will 
rush at you. Moreover, young men are embarrassed by hav- 
ing inherited their fathers' opinions. I have often said that 
the use of a university is to make young gentlemen as unlike 
their fathers as possible. I do not say that with the least 
disrespect for the fathers; but every man who is old enough 
to have a son in college is old enough to have become very 
seriously immersed in some particular business and is almost 
certain to have caught the point of view of that particular 
business. And it is very useful to his son to be taken out of 
that narrow circle, conducted to some high place where he 
may see the general map of the world and of the interests of 
mankind, and there shown how big the world is and how 
much of it his father may happen to have forgotten. It would 
be worth while for men, middle-aged and old, to detach them- 
selves more frequently from the things that command their 
daily attention and to think of the sweeping tides of hu- 
manity. 

Therefore I am interested in this association, because it is 
intended to bring young men together before any crust has 
formed over them, before they have been hardened to any 
particular occupation, before they have caught an inveterate 
point of view; while they still have a searchlight that they 
can swing and see what it reveals of all the circumstances of 
the hidden world. 

I am the more interested in it because it is an association 



50 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

of young men who are Christians. I wonder if we attach 
sufficient importance to Christianity as a mere instrumental- 
ity in the Kfe of mankind. For one, I am not fond of think- 
ing of Christianity as the means of saving individual souls. 
I have always been very impatient of processes and institu- 
tions which said that their purpose was to put every man in 
the way of developing his character. My advice is: Do not 
think about your character. If you will think about what 
you ought to do for other people, your character will take 
care of itself. Character is a by-product, and any man who 
devotes himself to its cultivation in his own case will become 
a selfish prig. The only way your powers can become great 
is by exerting them outside the circle of your own narrow, 
special, selfish interests. And that is the reason of Chris- 
tianity. Christ came into the world to save others, not to 
save himself; and no man is a true Christian w^o does not 
think constantly of how he can lift his brother, how he can 
assist his friend, how he can enlighten mankind, how he can 
make virtue the rule of conduct in the circle in which he lives. 
An association merely of young men might be an association 
that had its energies put forth in every direction, but an as- 
sociation of Christian young men is an association meant to 
put its shoulders under the world and lift it, so that other 
men may feel that they have companions in bearing the 
weight and heat of the day; that other men may know that 
there are those who care for them, who would go into places 
of difficulty and danger to rescue them, who regard them- 
selves as their brother's keeper. 

And, then, I am glad that it is an association. Every 
word of its title means an element of strength. Young men 
are strong. Christian young men are the strongest kind of 
young men, and when they associate themselves together they 
have the incomparable strength of organization. The Young 
Men's Christian Association once excited, perhaps it is not 
too much to say, the hostility of the organized churches of 
the Christian world, because the movement looked as if it 
were so nonsectarian, as if it were so outside the ecclesiasti- 
cal field, that perhaps it was an effort to draw young men 
away from the churches and to substitute this organization 
for the great bodies of Christian people who joined them- 



Oct. 24] YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION 51 

selves in the Christian denominations. But after a while it 
appeared that it was a great instrumentality that belonged to 
all the churches; that it was a common instrument for send- 
ing the light of Christianity out into the world in its most 
practical form, drawing young men who were strangers into 
places where they could have companionship that stimulated 
them and suggestions that kept them straight and occupations 
that amused them \nthout vicious practice; and then, by sur- 
rounding themselves with an atmosphere of purity and of 
simplicity of life, catch something of a glimpse of the great 
ideal which Christ lifted when He was elevated upon the 
cross. 

I remember hearing a very wise man say once, a man 
grown old m the service of a great church, that he had never 
taught his son religion dogmatically at any time; that he 
and the boy's mother had agreed that if the atmosphere of 
that home did not make a Christian of the boy, nothing that 
they could say would make a Christian of him. They knew 
that Christianity was catching, and if they did not have it, 
it would not be communicated. If they did have it, it would 
penetrate while the boy slept, almost; while he was uncon- 
scious of the sweet influences that were about him, while he 
reckoned nothing of instruction, but m.erely breathed into his 
lungs the wholesome air of a Christian home. That is the 
principle of the Young Men's Christian Association — to make 
a place where the atmosphere makes great ideals contagious. 
That is the reason that I said, though I had forgotten that I 
said it, what is quoted on the outer page of the program — 
that you can test a modem community by the degree of its 
interest in its Young Men's Christian Association. You can 
test whether it knows what road it wants to travel or not. 
You can test whether it is deeply interested in the spiritual 
and essential prosperity of its rising generation. I know of 
no test that can be more conclusively put to a community 
than that. 

I want to suggest to the young men of this association 
that it is the duty of young men not only to combine for 
the things that are good, but to combine in a militant spirit. 
There is a fine passage in one of Milton's prose writings 
which I am sorry to say I can not quote, but tiie meaning of 



52 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [igir, 

which I can give you, and it is worth hearing. He says 
that he has no patience with a cloistered virtue that does 
not go out and seek its adversary. Ah, how tired I am of 
the men who are merely on the defensive, \^^o hedge them- 
selves in, who perhaps enlarge the hedge enough to include 
their little family circle and ward off all the evil influences 
of the world from that loved and hallowed group. How 
tired I am of the men whose virtue is selfish because it is 
merely self-protective! How much I wish that men by the 
hundred m.ight volunteer to go out and seek an adversary 
and subdue him ! 

I have had the fortune to take part in affairs of a con- 
siderable variety of s us, and I have tried to hate as few 
persons as possible but there is an exquisite combination 
of contempt and hate that I have for a particular kind of 
person, and that is the moral coward. I \^ish we could 
give all cur cowards a perpetual vacation. Let them go off 
and sit on the side lines and see us play the game; and put 
them oft the field if they interfere with tne game They 
do nothing but harm, and they do it by that most subtle and 
fatal thinq^ of all, "that of taking tht momentum and the 
spirit and the forward dash out of things. A nian who is 
virtuous and a coward has no marketable virtue about him. 
The virtue, I repeat, which is merely self-defensive is not 
serviceable even, I suspect, to himself Fot how a man can 
swallow and not taste bad when he is a coward and thinking 
only of himself i can not imagine. 

Be militant! Be an organization that is going to do things! 
If you can find older men who will give you countenance 
and acceptable leadership follow them: but if you can not, 
organize separately and dispense with them. There are only 
two sorts of men worth associating with when something is 
to be done. Those are young men and men who never grow 
old. Now, if you find men who have gro\Mi old, about whom 
the crust has hardened, whose hinges are stiff, whose minds 
always have their eye over the shoulder thinking of things 
as they were done, do not have anything to do uith them. 
It would not be Christian to exclude them from your organi- 
zation, but merely used them to pad the roll. If you can find 
older men who will lead you acceptably and keep you in 



Oct. 24] YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION 53 

countenance, I am bound as an older man to advise you to 
follow them. But suit yourselves. Do not follow people 
that stand still. Just remind them that this is not a statical 
proposition; it is a movement, and if they can not get a 
move on them they are not serviceable. 

Life, gentlemen — the life of society, the life of the world 
— has constantly to be fed from the bottom. It has to be 
fed by those great sources of strength which are constantly 
rising in new generations. Red blood has to be pumped into 
it. New fiber has to be supplied. That is the reason I have 
always said that I believed in popular institutions. If you 
can guess beforehand whom your rulers are going to be, 
you can guess with a very great certainty that most of them 
will not be fit to rule. The beauty of popular institutions 
is that you do not know where the man is going to come 
from, and you do not care so he is the right man. You do 
not know whether he will come from the avenue or from 
the alley. You do not know whether he will come from the 
city or the farm. You do not know whether you will ever 
have heard that name before or not. Therefore you do not 
limit at any point your supply of new strength. You do not 
say it has got to come through the blood of a particular 
family or through the processes of a particular training, or 
by anything except the native impulses and genius of the 
man himself. The humblest hovel, therefore, may produce 
you your greatest man. A very humble hovel did produce 
you one of your greatest men. That is the process of life, 
this constant surging up of the new strength of unnamed, 
unrecognized, uncatalogued men who are just getting into 
the running, who are just coming up from the masses of the 
unrecognized multitude. You do not know when you will see 
above the level masses of the crowd some great stature 
lifted head and shoulders above the rest, shouldering its way, 
not violently but gently, to the front and saying, "Here am 
I; follow me." And his voice will be your voice, his thought 
will be your thought, and you will follow him as if you were 
following the best things in yourselves. 

"W^en I think of an association of Christian young men I 
wonder that it h2s not already turned the w^orld upside down. 
I wonder, not that it has done so much, for it has done a 



54 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

great deal, but that it has done so little; and I can only 
conjecture that it does not realize its own strength. I can 
only imagine that it has not yet got its pace. I wish I could 
believe, and I do beHeve, that at 70 it is just reaching its 
majority, and that from this time on a dream greater even 
than George William.s ever dreamed will be realized in the 
great accumulating momentum of Christian men throughout 
the world. For, gentlemen, this is an age in which the 
principles of men who utter public opinion dominate the 
world. It makes no difference what is done for the time 
being. After the struggle is over the jury will sit, and 
nobody can corrupt that jury. * * * 

Eternal vigilance is the price, not only of liberty, but of a 
great many other things. It is the price of everything that 
is good. It is the price of one's own soul. It is the price of 
the souls of the people you love; and w^hen it comes down 
to the final reckoning you have a standard that is immutable. 
What shall a man give in exchange for his own soul? Will 
he sell that? Will he consent to see another man sell his 
soul? Will he consent to see the conditions of his community 
such that men's souls are debauched and trodden under- 
foot in the mire? What shall he give in exchange for his 
own soul, or any other man's soul? And since the world, the 
world of affairs, the world of society, is nothing less and 
nothing more than all of us put together, it is a great enter- 
prise for the salvation of the soul in this world as well as in 
the next. There is a text in Scripture that has always 
interested me profoundly. It says godliness is profitable in 
this life as well as in the life that is to come; and if 3^ou do 
not start it in this life, it will not reach the life that is to come. 
Your measurements, your directions, your whole momentum, 
have to be established before you reach the next world. This 
world is intended as the place in which we shall show that 
we know how to grow in the stature of manliness and of 
righteousness. 

I have come here to bid Godspeed to the great work of 
the Young Men's Christian Association. I love to think of 
the gathering force of such things as this in the generations 
to come. If a m.an had to measure the accomplishments of 
society, the progress of reform, the speed of the world's 



Oct. 24] YOUNG MEN'S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION 55 

betterment, by the few little things that happened in his 
own life, by the trifling things that he can contribute to 
accomplish, he would indeed feel that the cost was much 
greater than the result. But no man can look at the past of 
the history of this world without seeing a vision of the future 
of the history of this world; and when you think of the 
accumulated moral forces that have made one age better than 
another age in the progress of mankind, then you can open 
your eyes to the vision. You can see that age by age, 
though with a blind struggle in the dust of the road, though 
often mistaking the path and losing its way in the mire, 
mankind is yet — sometimes with bloody hands and battered 
knees — nevertheless struggling step after step up the slow 
stages to the day when he shall live in the full light which 
shines upon the uplands, where all the light that illumines 
mankind shines direct from the face of God. 

White House Pamphlet. 

19. FOREIGN TRADE AND SHIP BUILDING 

(December 8, 19 14) 
Address to Congress 

The session upon which you are now entering will be the 
closing session of the Sixty-third Congress, a Congress, I 
venture to say, which will long be remembered for the great 
body of thoughtful and constructive v/ork which it has done, 
in loyal response to the thought and needs of the country. 
I should like in this address to review the- notable record 
and try to make adequate assessment of it; but no doubt 
w'e stand too near the work that has been done and are 
ourselves too much part of it to play the part of historians 
toward it. 

Our program of legislation with regard to the regulation 
of business is now virtually complete. It has been put forth, 
as we intended, as a whole, and leaves no conjecture as to 
what is to follow. The road at last lies clear and firm 
before business. It is a road which it can travel without fear 



^0 



ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 



or embarrassment. It is the road to ungrudged, unclouded 
success. In it every honest man, every man who beheves 
that the public interest is part of his own interest, may walk 
with perfect confidence. 

Moreover, our thoughts are now more of the future than 
of the past. While we have worked at our tasks of peace 
the circumstances of the whole age have been altered by war. 
WTiat we have done for our own. land and our own people we 
did with the best that was in us, whether of character or of 
intelligence, with sober enthusiasm and a confidence in the 
principles upon which we were acting which sustained us at 
every step of the difficult undertaking; but it is done. It 
has passed from our hands. It is now an established part 
of the legislation of the country. Its usefulness, its effects 
will disclose themselves in experience. What chiefly strikes 
us now, as we look about us during these closing days of a 
year which will be forever memorable in the history of the 
world, is that we face new tasks, have been facing them these 
six months, must face them in the months to come, — face 
them without partisan feeling, like men who have forgotten 
everything but a common duty and the fact that we are 
representatives of a great people whose thought is not of us 
but of what America owes to herself and to all mankind in 
such circumstances as these upon which we look amazed and 
anxious. 

War has interrupted the means of trade not only but also 
the processes of production. In Europe it is destroying men 
and resources wholesale and upon a scale unprecedented 
and appalling. There is reason to fear that the time is near, 
if it be not already at hand, when several of the countries 
of Europe will find it difficult to do for their people what 
they have hitherto been always easily able to do, — many 
essential and fundamental things. At any rate, they will 
need our help and our manifold services as they have never 
needed them before; and we should be ready, more fit and 
ready than we have ever been. 

It is of equal consequence that the nations whom Europe 
has usually supplied ^\ith innumerable articles of manufac- 
ture and commerce of which they are in constant need and 
without which their economic development halts and stands 



Dec. 8] FOREIGN TRADE AND SHIPBUILDING 57 

still can now get only a small part of what they formerly 
imported and eagerly look to us to supply their all but 
empty markets. This is particularly true of our own 
neighbors, the States, great and small, of Central and South 
America. Their lines of trade have hitherto run chiefly 
athwart the seas, not to our ports but to the ports of Great 
Britain and of the older continent of Europe. I do not stop 
to inquire why, or to make any comment on probable causes. 
What interests us just now is not the explanation but the 
fact, and our duty and opportunity in the presence of it. 
Here are markets which we must supply, and we must find 
the means of action. The United States, this great people 
for whom we speak and act, should be ready, as never before, 
to serv^e itself and to serve mankind; ready with its resources, 
its energies, its forces of production, and its means of dis- 
tribution. 

It is a very practical matter, a matter of ways and means. 
We have the resources, but are we fully ready to use them? 
And, if we can make ready what we have, have we the means 
at hand to distribute it? We are not fully ready; neither 
have we the means of distribution. We are willing, but we 
are not fully able. We have the wish to serve and to serve 
greatly, generously; but we are not prepared as we should 
be. We are not ready to mobilize our resources at once. 
We are not prepared to use them immediately and at their 
best, \^ithout delay and without waste. 

To speak plainly, we have grossly erred in the way in 
which we have stunted and hindered the development of our 
merchant marine. And now, when we need ships, we have 
not got them. We have year after year debated, without 
end or conclusion, the best policy to pursue with regard to 
the use of the ores and forests and water powers of our 
national domain in the rich States of the West, when we 
should have acted; and they are still locked up. The key 
is still turned upon them, the door shut fast at which 
thousands of vigorous men, full of initiative, knock clam- 
orously for admittance. The water power of our navigable 
streams outside the national domain also, even in the eastern 
States, where we have worked and planned for generations, 
is still not used as it might be, because we will and we won't; 



58 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 14 

because the laws we have made do not intelligently balance 
encouragement against restraint. We withhold by regu- 
lation, 

I have come to ask you to remedy and correct these mis- 
takes and omissions, even at this short session of a Congress 
which would certainly seem to have done all the work that 
could reasonably be expected of it. The time and the cir- 
cumstances are extraordinary, and so must our efforts be 
also. 

Fortunately, two great measures, finely conceived, the 
one to unlock, with proper safeguards, the resources of the 
national domain, the other to encourage the use of the navi- 
gable waters outside that domain for the generation of power, 
have already passed the House of Representatives and are 
ready for immediate consideration and action by the Senate. 
With the deepest earnestness I urge their prompt passage. 
In them both we turn our backs upon hesitation and make- 
shift and formulate a genuine policy of use and conservation, 
in the best sense of those words. We owe the one measure 
not only to the people of that great western country for 
whose free and systematic developrhent. as it seems to me, 
our legislation has done so little, but afeo to the people of 
the Nation as a whole; and we as clearly 0^ the other in 
fulfillment of our repeated promises that the water power 
of the country should in fact as well as in name be put at the 
disposal of great industries which can make economical and 
profitable use of it, the rights of the public being adequately 
guarded the while, and monopoly in the use prevented. To 
have begun such measures and not completed them would 
indeed mar the record of this great Congress very seriously. 
I hope and confidently believe that they will be completed. 

And there is another great piece of legislation which 
awaits and should receive the sanction of the Senate: I mean 
the bill which gives a larger measure of self-government to 
the people of the Philippines. How better, in this time of 
anxious questioning and perplexed policy, could we show our 
confidence in the principles of liberty, as the source as well 
as the expression of life, how better could we demonstrate our 
self-possession and steadfastness in the courses of justice and 
disinterestedness than by thus going calmly forward to fulfill 



Dec. 8] FOREIGN TRADE AND SHIPBUILDING 59 

our promises to a dependent people, who will now look more 
anxiously than ever to see whether we have indeed the liber- 
ality, the unselfishness, the courage, the faith we have boasted 
and professed. I can not believe that the Senate will let 
this great measure of constructive justice await the action 
of another Congress. Its passage would nobly crown the 
record of these two years of memorable labor. 

But I think that you will agree with me that this does not 
complete the toll of our duty. How are we to carry our 
goods to the empty markets of which I have spoken if we 
have not the ships? How are we to build up a great trade 
if we have not the certain and constant means of trans- 
portation upon which all profitable and useful commerce 
depends? And how are we to get the ships if we wait for 
the trade to develop without them? To correct the many 
mistakes by which we have discouraged and all but de- 
stroyed the merchant marine of the country, to retrace the 
steps by which we have, it seems almost deliberately, with- 
drawn our flag from the seas, except where, here and there, a 
ship of war is bidden carry it or some wandering yacht 
displays it, would take a long time and involve many de- 
tailed items of legislation, and the trade which we ought 
immedately to handle would disappear or find other chan- 
nels while we debated the items. 

The case is not unlike that which confronted us when cur 
owTi continent was to be opened up to settlement and indus- 
try, and we needed long lines of railway, extended means of 
transportation prepared beforehand, if development was not 
to lag intolerably and wait interminably. We lavishly sub- 
sidized the building of transcontinental railroads. We look 
back upon that with regret now, because the subsidies led to 
many scandals of which we are ashamed; but we know that 
the railroads had to be built, and if we had it to do over 
again we should of course build them, but in another way. 
Therefore I propose another way of providing the means of 
transportation, which must precede, not tardily follow, the 
development of our trade with our neighbor states of 
America. It may seem a reversal of the natural order of 
things, but it is true, that the routes of trade must be actually 
opened — by many ships and regular sailings and moderate 



6o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1914 

charges — before streams of merchandise will flow freely and 
profitably tlirough them. 

Hence the pending shipping bill, discussed at the last 
session but as yet passed by neither House. In my judg- 
ment such legislation is imperatively needed and can not 
wisely be postp>oned. The Government must open these 
gates of trade, and open them ^\ide; open them before it is 
altogether profitable to open them, or altogether reasonable 
to ask private capital to open them at a venture. It is not 
a question of the Government monopolizing the field. It 
should take action to make it certain that transportation at 
reasonable rates v/ill be promptly provided, even where the 
carriage is not at first profitable; and then, when the carriage 
has become sufficiently profitable to attract and engage pri- 
vate capital, and engage it in abundance, ^he Government 
ought to v.nthdrav/. I ven/ earnestly hope that the Congress 
will be of this opinion, and that both Houses will adopt this 
exceedingly important bill. * ''^ * 

I v/ould be negligent of a very manifest duty were I not 
to call the attention of the Senate to the fact that the pro- 
posed convention for safety at sea awaits its confirmation 
and that the limit fixed in the convention itself for its 
acceptance is the last day of the present m.onth. The con- 
ference in which this convention originated was called by the 
United States; the representatives of the United States 
played a very influential part indeed in framing the provi- 
sions of the proposed convention; and those provisions are 
in themselves for the most part admirable. It would hardly 
be consistent v/ith the part we have played in the whole 
matter to let it drop and go by the board as if forgotten and 
neglected. It was ratified in May last by the German 
Government and in August by the Parliament of Great 
Britain. It marks a most hopeful and decided advance in 
international civilization. We should show our earnest faith 
in a great matter by adding our own acceptance of it. * * * 

White House Pampldet. 



YEAR 1915 

20. THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY 

(January 8, 1915) 
Jackson Day Address at Indianapolis 

You have given me a most royal welcome, for which I 
thank you from the bottom of my heart. It is rather lonely 
living in Washington. I have been confined for two years 
at hard labor, and even now I feel that I am simply out on 
parole. You notice that one of the most distinguished 
Members of the United States Senate is here to see that I 
go back. And yet, with sincere apologies to the Senate and 
House of Representatives, I want to say that I draw more 
inspiration from you than I do from them. They, like 
myself, are only servants of the people of the United States. 
Our sinews consist in your sympathy and support, and our 
renewal comes from contact with you and with the strong 
movements of public opinion in the country. 

That is the reason why I for one would prefer that our 
thoughts should not too often cross the ocean, but should 
center themselves upon the policies and duties of the United 
States. If we think rightly of the United States, when the 
time comes we shall know how this country can serve the 
world. I will borrow a very interesting phrase from a dis- 
tinguished gentleman of my acquaintance and beg that you 
will "keep your moral powder dry." 

But I have come here on Jackson Day. If there are 
Republicans present, T hope they will feel the compelling 
influences of such a day. "^here was nothing mild about 
Andrew Jackson; that is the reason I spoke of the "com- 
pelling influences" of the day. Andrew Jackson was a 

61 



62 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 5 

forthright man who believed everything he did believe ip 
fighting earnest. And really, ladies and gentlemen, in public 
life that is the only sort of man worth thinking about for a 
moment. If I was not ready to fight for everything I believe 
in, I v/ould think it my duty to go back and take a back 
seat. I like, therefore, to breathe the air of Jackson Day. 
I like to be reminded of the old militant hosts of Democracy 
which I believe have come to life again in our time. The 
United States had almost forgotten that it m.ust keep its 
fighting ardor in behalf of mankind when Andrew Jackson 
became President; and you will notice that whenever the 
United States forgets its ardor for mankind it is necessary 
that a Democrat should be elected President. 

The trouble with the Republican Party is that it has not 
had a new idea for thirty years. I am not speaking as a 
politician; I am speaking as an historian. I have looked for 
new ideas in the records and I have not found any proceed- 
ing irom the Republican ranks. They have had leaders from 
time to time vrho suggested new ideas, but they never did 
anything to carry them out. I suppose there was no harm 
in their talking, provided they could not do anything. There- 
fore, when it was necessary to say that we had talked about 
things long enough which it was necessary to do, and the 
time had come to do them, it was in d^'spen sable that a 
Democrat should be elected President. 

I would not speak with disrespect of the Republican 
Party. I always speak with great respect of the past. The 
past was necessary to the present, and was a sure prediction 
of the future. The Republican Party is still a covert and 
refuge for those vv'ho are afraid, for those who w^ant to con- 
sult their grandfathers about everything. You will notice 
that most of the advice taken by the Republican Party is 
taken from gentlemen old enough to be grandfathers, and 
that when they claim that a reaction has taken place, they 
react to the reelection of the oldest members of their party. 
They will not trust the youngsters. They are f raid the young- 
sters may have something up their sleeve. 

You will see, therefore, that I have come to you in the 
spirit of Jackson Day. I got very tired staying in Washing- 
ton and saying sweet things. I wanted to come out and get 



Jan. 8] THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY 63 

contact with you once more and say what I really thought. 

My friends, what I particularly w^ant you to observe is 
this, that politics in this country does not depend any longer 
upon the regular members of either party. There are not 
enough regular Republicans in this country to take and hol(i 
national power; and I must immediately add there are not 
enough regular Democrats in this country to do it, either. 
This country is guided and its policy is determined by the 
independent voter; and I have come to ask you how we can 
best prove to the independent voter that the instrument 
he needs is the - Democratic Party, and that it would be 
hopeless for him to attempt to use the Republican Party. I 
do not have to prove it; I admit it. 

What seems to me perfectly evident is this: That if you! 
made a rough reckoning, you would have to admit that only 
about one- third of the Republican Party is progressive; and 
you would also have to admit that about two-thirds of the 
Democratic Party is progressive. Therefore, the independent 
progressive voter finds a great deal more company in the 
Democratic ranks than in the Republican ranks. I say a 
great deal more, because there are Democrats who are sitting 
on the breeching strap: there are Democrats who are holding 
back; there are Democrats who are nervous. I dare say 
they were bom with that temperament. And I respect the 
conservative temper. I claim to be an animated conservative 
myself, because being a conservative I understand to mean 
being a man not only who preserves w^hat is best in the 
Nation but who sees that in order to preserve it you dare 
not stand still but must move forward. The virtue of 
America is not statical; it is dynamic. All the forces of 
America are forces in action or else they are forces of inertia. 

What I want to point out to you — and I believe that this 
is what the whole country is beginning to perceive — is this, 
that there is a larger body of men in the regular ranks of 
the Democratic Party who believe in the progressive policies 
of our day and mean to see them carried forward and per- 
petuated than there is in the ranks of the Republican 
Party. How can it be otherwise, gentlemen? The Demo- 
cratic Party, and the only Democratic Party, has carried out 
the policies which the progressive people of this country have 



64 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

desired. There is not a single great act of this present great 
Congress which has not been carried out in obedience to the 
public opinion of America; and the public opinion of America 
is not going to permit an}^ body of men to go backward with 
regard to these great matters. * * * 

But the Democratic Party is not to suppose that it is done 
with the business. The Democratic Party is still on trial. 
The Democratic Party still has to prove to the independent 
voters of the country not only that it believes in these things, 
but that it will continue to work along these lines and that 
it will not allow any enemy of these things to break its 
ranks. This country is not going to use any party that can 
not do continuous and consistent teamwork. If any group 
of men should dare to break the solidarity of the Democratic 
team for any purpose or from any motive, theirs v.ill be a 
most unenviable notoriety and a responsibility which will 
bring deep bitterness to them. The only party that is ser- 
viceable to a nation is a party that can hold absolutely to- 
gether and march with the discipline and with the zest of a 
conquering host. 

I am not saying these things because I doubt that the 
Democratic Party will be able to do this, but because I 
believe that as leader for the time being of that party I can 
promise the country that it vnll do these things. I know my 
colleagues at Washington; I know their spirit and their pur- 
pose; and I knov/ that they have the same emotion, the same 
high emotion of public service, that I hope I have. =*= =^' * 

There is one thing I have got a great enthusiasm about, 
I might almost say a reckless enthusiasm, and that is human 
liberty. The Governor has just now spoken about watchful 
waiting in Mexico. I want to say a v/ord about Mexico, or 
not so much about Mexico as about our attitude towards 
Mexico. I hold it as a fundamental principle, and so do 
you, that every people has the right to determine its own 
form of government; and until this recent revolution in 
Mexico, until the end of the Diaz reign, eighty per cent of 
the people of Mexico never had a "look in" in determining 
who should be their governors or what their government 
should be. Now, I am for the eighty per cent! It is none of 
my business, and it is none of your business, how long they 



Jan. 8] THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY 65 

take in determining it. It is none of my business, and it is 
none of yours, how they go about the business. The country 
is theirs. The Government is theirs. The Hberty, if they 
can get it, and Godspeed them in getting it, is theirs. And 
so far as my influence goes while I am President nobody| 
shall interfere with them. 

That is what I mean by a great emotion, the great emotion 
of sympathy. Do you suppose that the Am^erican people 
are ever going to count a small amount of material benefit 
and advantage to people doing business in Mexico against 
the liberties and the permanent happiness of the Mexican 
people? Have not European nations taken as long as they 
wanted and spilt as much blood as they pleased in settling 
their affairs, and shall we deny that to Mexico because she 
is weak? No, I say! I am proud to belong to a strong 
nation that says, "This country which we could crush shall 
have just as much freedom in her owti affairs as we have." 
If I am strong, I am ashamed to bully the weak. In pro- 
portion to my strength is my pride in withholding that 
strength from the oppression of another people. And I 
know when I speak these things, not merely from the gen- 
erous response with which they have just met from you, but 
from my long-time knowledge of the American people, that 
that is the sentiment of this great people. With all due) 
respect to editors of great newspapers, I have to say to them 
that I seldom take my opinion of the American people from 
their editorials. WTien some great dailies not very far from' 
where I am temporarily residing thundered with rising scorn 
at watchful waiting, my confidence was not for a moment 
shaken. I Icnew what were the temper and principles of the 
American people. If I did not at least think I knew, I would 
emigrate, because I would not be satisfied to stay where I 
am. There may come a time when the American people 
will have to judge whether I know what I am talking about 
or not, but at least for two years more I am free to think 
that I do, with a great comfort in immimity in the time 
being. 

It is, by the way, a very comforting thought that the next 
Congress of the United States is going to be very safely 
Democratic and that, therefore, we can all together feel as 



66 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

much confidence as Jackson did that we know what we are 
about. You know Jackson used to think that everybody who 
disagreed with him was an enemy of the country. I have 
never got quite that far in my thought, but I have ventured 
to think that they did not know what they were talking 
about, knowing that my fellow Democrats expected me to 
live up to the full stature of Jacksonian Democracy. 

I feel, my friends, in a very confident mood to-day. I feel 
confident that we do know the spirit of the American people, 
that we do know the program of betterment which it will 
be necessary for us to undertake, that we do have a very 
reasonable confidence in the support of the American people. 
I have been talking with business men recently about the 
present state of mind of American business. There is nothing 
the matter with American business except a state of mind. 
I understand that your chamber of commerce here in Indian- 
apolis is working now upon the motto "If you are going to 
buy it, buy it now." That is a perfectly safe maxim to 
act on. It is just as safe to buy it now as it ever will be, 
and if you start the buying there will be no end to it, and 
you will be a seller as well as a buyer. I am just as sure of 
that as I can be, because I have taken counsel with the men 
who know. I never was in business and, therefore, I have 
none of the prejudices of business. I have looked on and 
tried to see what the interests of the country were in busi- 
ness; I have taken counsel with men who did know, and 
their counsel is uniform, that all that is needed in America 
now is to believe in the future; and I can assure you as one 
of those who speak for the Democratic Party that it is 
perfectly safe to believe in the future. We are so much 
the friends of business that we were for a little time the 
enemies of those who were trying to control business. I say 
"for a little time" because we are now reconciled to them. 
They have graciously admitted that we had a right to do 
what we did do, and they have very handsomely said that 
they were going to play the game. 

I believe — I always have believed — that American business 
men were absolutely sound at heart, but men immersed in 
business do a lot of things that opportunity offers which in 
other circumstances they would not do; and I have thought 



Jan. 8] THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY 67 

all along that all that was necessary to do was to call their / 
attention sharply to the kind of reforms in business which 
were needed and that they would acquiesce. Why, I believe 
they have heartily acquiesced. There is all the more reason, 
therefore, that, great and small, we should be confident in the, 
future. 

And what a future it is, my friends! Look abroad upon 
the troubled world! Only America at peace! Among all 
the great powers of the world only America saving her power 
for her ovm people! Only America using her great character 
and her great strength in the interests of peace and of pros- 
perity! Do you not think it likely that the world will some 
time turn to America and say, "You were right and we were 
wrong. You kept your head when we lost ours. You tried 
to keep the scale from tipping, and we threw the whole 
weight of arms in one side of the scale. Now, in your self- 
possession, in your coolness, in your strength, may we not 
turn to you for counsel and for assistance?" Think of the 
deep-wrought destruction of economic resources, of life, and 
of hope that is taking place in some parts of the world, and 
think of the reservoir of hope, the reservoir of energy, the 
reservoir of sustenance that there is in this great land of 
plenty! May we not look forward to the time when we 
shall be called blessed among the nations, because we suc- 
cored the nations of the world in their time of distress and 
of dismay? I for one pray God that that solemn hour may 
come, and I know the solidity of character and I know the 
exaltation of hope, I know the big principle with which the 
American people will respond to the call of the world for 
this service. I thank God that those who believe in America, 
who try to serve her people, are likely to be also what 
America herself from the first hoped and meant to be — the 
servant of mankind. White House Pamphlet, 

21. PROPER TESTS OF IMMIGRANTS 

(January 28, 1915) 

Veto Message of the Literacy Test Bill 

It is with unaffected regret that I find myself constrained 
by clear conviction to return this bill (H. R. 6060, "An act 



68 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

to regulate the immigration of aliens to and the residence of 
aliens in the United States") without my signature. Not 
only do I feel it to be a very serious matter to exercise the 
power of veto in any case, because it involves opposing the 
single judgment of the President to the judgment of a ma- 
jority of both the Houses of the Congress, a step which no 
man who realizes his own liability to error can take without 
great hesitation, but also because this particular bill is in so 
many important respects admirable, well conceived, and 
desirable. Its enactment into law would undoubtedly en- 
hance the efficiency and improve the methods of handling 
the important branch of the public service to which it relates. 
But candor and a sense of duty with regard to the responsi- 
bility so clearly im.pcsed upon me by the Constitution in 
matters of legislation leave me no choice but to dissent. 

In two particulars of vital consequence this bill embodies 
a radical departure from the traditional and long-established 
polic}^ of this country, a policy in which our people have 
conceived the very character of their Government to be ex- 
pressed, the very mission and spirit of the Nation in respect 
of its relations to the peoples of the v^^orld outside their bor- 
ders. It seeks to all but close entirely the gates of asylum 
which have always been open to those who could find no- 
"where else the right and opportunity of constitutional agita- 
tion for what they conceived to be the natural and inalienable 
rights of men; and it excludes those to w^om the oppor- 
tunities of elementary education have been denied, without 
regard to their character, their purposes, or their natural 
capacity. 

Restrictions like these, adopted earlier in our history as a 
Nation, would very materially have altered the course and 
cooled the humane ardors of our politics. The right of po- 
litical asylum has brought to this country many a man of 
noble character and elevated purpose who was marked as an 
outlaw in his own less fortunate land, and who has yet 
become an ornament to our citizenship and to our public 
councils. The children and the compatriots of these illus- 
trious Americans mr.st stand am.azed to see the representa- 
tives of their Nation now resolved, in the fullness of our 
national strength and at the maturity of our great institu- 



Jan. 28] THE PROPER TEST OF IMMIGRANTS 69 

tions, to risk turning such men back from our shores without 
test of quality or purpose. It is difficult for me to believe 
that the full effect of this feature of the bill was realized 
when it was framed and adopted, cind it is impossible for me 
to assent to it in the form in w^hich it is here cast. 

The literacy test and the tests and restrictions which ac- 
company it constitute an even more radical change in the 
policy of the Nation. Hitherto we have generously kept our 
doors open to all who were not unfitted by reason of disease 
or incapacity for self-support or such personal records and 
antecedents as were likely to make them a menace to our 
peace and order or to the wholesome and essential relation- 
ships of life. In this bill it is proposed to turn away from 
tests of character and of quality and impose tests which 
exclude and restrict; for the new tests here embodied are not 
tests of quality or of character or of personal fitness, but 
tests of opportunity. Those who come seeking opportunity 
are not to be admitted unless they have already had one of 
the chief of the opportunities they seek, the opportunity of 
education. The object of such provisions is restriction, not 
selection. 

If the people of this country have made up their minds to 
limit the number of immigrants by arbitrary tests and so 
reverse the policy of all the generations of Americans that 
have gone before them, it is their right to do so. I am their 
servant and have no license to stand in their way. But I do 
not believe that they have. I respectfully submit that no 
one can quote their mandate to that effect. Has any political 
party ever avowed a policy of restriction in this fundamental 
matter, gone to the country on it, and been commissioned to 
control its legislation? Does this bill rest upon the conscious 
and universal assent and desire of the American people? 
I doubt it. It is because I doubt it that I make bold to 
dissent from it. I am willing to abide by the verdict, but 
not until it has been rendered. Let the platforms of parties 
speak out upon this policy and the people pronounce their 
wish. The matter is too fundamental to be settled otherwise. 

I have no pride of opinion in this question. I am not 
foolish enough to profess to knov; the wishes and ideals of 
America better than the body of her chosen representatives 



70 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 , 

know them. I only want instruction direct from those whose \i 
fortunes, with ours and all men's, are involved. 

White House Pamphlet. \ 



22. NATIONAL COMMERCE 

(February 3, 1915) 



Address to the United States Chamber of Commerce, 
AT Washington 

I feel that it is hardly fair to you for me to come in in 
this casual fashion among a body of men who have been 
seriously discussing great questions, and it is hardly fair to 
me, because I come in cold, not having had the advantage of 
sharing the atmosphere of your deliberations and catching 
the feeling of your conference. Moreover, I hardly know 
just how to express my interest in the things you are under- 
taking. When a man stands outside an organization and 
speaks to it he is too apt to have the tone of outside com- 
mendation, as who should say, "I would desire to pat you 
on the back and say 'Good boys; you are doing well!' " I 
would a great deal rather have you receive me as if for the 
time being I were one of your oAvn number. 

Because the longer I occupy the office that I now occupy 
the more I regret any lines of separation ; the more I deplore 
any feeling that one set of men has one set of interests and 
another set of men another set of interests; the more I feel 
the solidarity of the Nation — the impossibility of separating 
one interest from another ^^^thout misconceiving it; the 
necessity that we should all understand one another, in order 
that we may understand ourselves. 

There is an illustration which I have used a great many 
times. I will use it again, because it is the most serviceable 
to my owTi mind. We often speak of a man who cannot find 
his way in some jungle or some desert as having "lost him- 
self." Did you never reflect that that is the only thing he 
has not lost? He is there. He has lost the rest of the world. 



Feb. 3] NATIONAL COMMERCE 71 

He has no fixed point bv which to steer. He does not know 
which is north, which is south, which is east, which is west; 
and if he did know, he is so confused that he would not know 
in which ol those directions his goal lay Therefore, follow- 
ing his heart, he walks in a great circle from right to left and 
comes back to where he started — to himself again. To my 
mind that is a picture of the world. If you have lost sight 
of other interests and do not know the relation of your own 
interests to those other interests, then you do not understand 
your own interests, and have lost yourself. WTiat you want 
is orientation, relationship to the points of the compass; lela- 
tionship to the other people in the world, vital connections 
which you have for the time being severea 

I am particularly glad to express my admiration for the 
kind of organization which you have drawn together. I have 
attended banquets of chambers of commerce in various 
pans of the country and have got the impression at each 
of those banquets that there was only one city in the country. 
It has seemed to me that those associations were meant in 
order to destroy men's perspective, in order to destroy their 
sen^e of relative proportions. Worst of all, if I may be 
permitted to say so, they were intended to boost something 
ir particular. Boosting is a very unhandsome thing. Ad- 
vancing enterprise is a very handsome thing, but to exag- 
gerate local merits in order to create disproportion in the 
general development is not a particularly handsome thing 
or a particularly intelligent thing. A city cannot grow on 
the face of a great state like a mushroom on that one spot. 
Its roots are throughout the state, and unless the state it is 
in, or the region it draws from, can itself thrive and pulse 
with life as a whole, the city can have no healthy growth. 
You forget the wide rootages of everything when you boost 
some particular region. There are dangers which probably 
you all understand in the mere practice of advertisement. 
When a man begins to advertise himself there are certain 
points that are somewhat exaggerated, and I have noticed 
that men who exaggerate most, most quickly lose any proper 
conception of what their own proportions are. Therefore, 
these local centers of enthusiasm may be local centers of 
mistake if they are not very wisely guided and if they do 



72 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

not themselves realize their relations to the other centers of 
enthusiasm and of advancement. 

The advantage about a Chamber of Commerce of the 
United States is that there is only one way to boost the 
United States, and that is by seeing to it that the conditions 
under which business is done throughout the whole country 
are the best possible conditions. There cannot be any dis- 
proportion about that. If you draw your sap and your 
vitality from all quarters, then the more sap and vitality 
there is in you the m.ore there is in the commonwealth as a 
whole, and every time you lift at all you lift the whole level 
of manufacturing and mercantile enterprise. Moreover, the 
advantage of it is that you cannot boost the United States 
in that way without understanding the United States. You 
learn a great deal. I agreed with a colleague of mine in 
the Cabinet the other day that we had never attended in 
our lives before a school to compare with that we were 
new attending for the purpose of gaining a liberal educa- 
tion. 

Of course, I learn a great many things that are not so, 
but the interesting thing about that is this: Things that 
are not so do net m.atch. If you hear enough of them, you 
see there is no pattern whatever; it is a crazy quilt. 
Whereas, the truth always matches, piece by piece, with 
other parts of the truth. No man can lie consistently, and 
he cannot lie about everything if he talks to you long. I 
would guarantee that if enough liars talked to you, you 
would get the truth; because the parts that they did not 
invent would match one another, and the parts that they did 
invent would not match one another. Talk long enough, 
therefore, and see the connections clearly enough, and you 
can patch together a case as a whole. I had somev/hat that 
experience about Mexico, and that was about the only way 
in which I learned anything that was true about it. For 
there has been vivid imaginations and many special interests 
which depicted things as they wished me to believe them 
to be. 

Seriously, the task of this body is to match all the facts 
of business throughout the country and to see the vast and 
consistent pattern of it. That is the reason I think you are 



Feb. 3] NATIONAL COMMERCE 73 

to be congratulated upon the fact that you can not do this 
thing without common counsel. There isn't any man who 
knows enough to comprehend the United States. It is a co- 
operative effort, necessarily. You can not perform the func- 
tions of this Chamber of Commerce without drawing in not 
only a vast number of men, but men, and a number of men, 
from every region and section of the country. The minute 
this association falls into the hands, if it ever should, of men 
from' a single section or men with a single set of interests 
most at heart, it will go to seed and die. Its strength must 
come from the uttermost parts of the land and must be 
compounded of brains and comprehensions of every sort. It 
is a very noble and handsome picture for the imagination, 
and I have asked myself before I came here to-day, what 
relation you could bear to the Government of the United 
States and what relation the Government could bear to 
you? 

There are two aspects and activities of the Government 
with which you will naturally come into most direct contact. 
The first is the Government's power of inquiry, systematic 
and disinterested inquiry, and its power of scientific assist- 
ance. You get an illustration of the latter, for example, in 
the Department of Agriculture. Has it occurred to you, I 
wonder, that we are just upon the eve of a time w^hen our 
Department of Agriculture will be of infinite importance to 
the w^hole world? There is a shortage of food in the world 
now. That shortage will be much more serious a few^ months 
from now than it is now\ It is necessary that we should 
plant a great deal more; it is necessary that our lands should 
yield more per acre than they do now; it is necessary that 
there should not be a plow or a spade idle in this country 
if the world is to be fed. And the methods of our farmers 
must feed upon the scientific information to be derived from 
the State departments of agriculture, and from that taproot 
of all, the United States Department of Agriculture. The 
object and use of that Department is to inform m.en of the 
latest developments and disclosures of science with regard 
to all the processes by which soils can be put to their proper 
use and their fertility made the greatest possible. Similarly 
with the Bureau of Standards. It is ready to supply those 



74 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

things by which you can set norms, you can set bases, for 
all the scientific processes of business. 

I have a great admiration for the scientific parts of the 
Government of the United States, and it has amazed me 
that so few men have discovered them. Here in these de- 
partments are quiet men, trained to the highest degree of 
skill, serving for a petty remuneration along lines that are 
infinitely useful to mankind; and yet in some cases they 
waited to be discovered until this Chamber of Commerce 
of the United States was established. Coming to this city, 
officers of that association found that there were here things 
that wejre infinitely useful to them and with w^hich the whole 
United States ought to be put into communication. 

The Government of the United States is very properly 
a great instrum.entality of inquiry and information. One 
thing we are just beginning to do that we ought to have 
done long ago: We ought long ago to have had our Bureau 
of Foreign and Domestic Commerce. We ought long ago 
to have sent the best eyes of the Government out into the 
world to see where the opportunities and openings of Ameri- 
can commerce and American genius w^ere to be found — men 
who were not sent out as the commercial agents of any 
particular set of business men in the United States, but who 
were eyes for the w^hole business community. I have been 
reading consular reports for twenty years. In what I came 
to regard as an evil day the Congressman from my district 
began to send me the consular reports, and they ate up more 
and more of my time. They are very interesting, but they 
are a good deal like what the old lady said of the dictionary, 
that it was very interesting but a little disconnected. You 
get a picture of the world as if a spotlight were being dotted 
about over the surface of it. Here you see a glimpse of this, 
and here you see a glimpse of that, and through the medium 
of some consuls you do not see anything at all; because 
the consul has to have eyes and the consul has to know 
what he is looking for. A literary friend of mine said that 
he used to believe in the maxim that ''everything comes to 
the man who waits," but he discovered after awhile by 
practical experience that it needed an additional clause, 
"provided he knows what he is waiting for." Unless you 



jlFeb.a] NATIONAL COMMERCE 75 

know what you are looking for and have trained eyes to see 
it when it comes your way, it may pass you unnoticed. We 
are just beginning to do, systematically and scientifically, 
what we ought long ago to have done, to employ the Govern- 
ment of the United States to survey the world in order that 
American commerce might be guided. 

But there are other ways of using the Government of the 
United States, ways that have long been tried, though not 
always with conspicuous success or fortunate results. You 
can use the Government of the United States by influencing 
its legislation. That has been a very active industry, but 
it has not always been managed in the interest of the whole 
people. It is very instructive and useful for the Govern- 
ment of the United States to have such means as you are 
ready to supply for getting a sort of consensus of opinion 
which proceeds from no particular quarter and originates 
with no particular interest. Information is the very founda- 
tion of all right action in legislation. * * * 

The trouble has been that when they [the men on the in- 
side of business] came in the past — for I think the thing is 
changing very rapidly — they came with all their bristles out; 
they came on the defensive; they came to see, not what they 
could •accomplish, but what they could prevent. They did not 
come to guide; they came to block. That is of no use what- 
ever to the general body politic. What has got to pervade 
us like a great motive power is that we cannot, and must 
not, separate our interests from one another, but must pool 
our interests. A man who is trying to fight for his single 
hand is fighting against the community and not fighting with 
it. There are a great many dreadful thing3 about war, as 
nobody needs to be told in this day of distress and of terror, 
but 4:here is one thing about war which has a very splendid 
side, and that is the consciousness that a whole nation gets 
that they must all act as a unit for a common end. And 
when peace is as handsome as war there will be no war. 
WTien men, I mean, engage in the pursuits of peace in the 
same spirit of self-sacrifice and of conscious service of the 
community with which, at any rate, the common soldier 
engages in war, then shall there be wars no more. You 
have moved the vanguard for the United States in the pur- 



76 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 i 

poses of this association just a little nearer that ideal. That j 
is the reason I am here, because I believe it. =^ * * 1 

There are thinking spaces in this countr\% and some of the » 
thinking done is very solid thinking indeed, the thinking ] 
- of the sort of men that we all love best, who think for them- 
selves, who do not see things as they are told to see them, j 
but look at them and see them independently; who, if they , 
are told they are white when they are black, plainly say , 
that they are black — men with eyes and with a courage 1 
back of those eyes to tell what they see. The country is 1 
full of those men. They have been singularly reticent some- j 
times, singularly silent, but the country is full of them, j 
And what I rejoice in is that you have called them into the j 
ranks. For your methods are bound to be democratic in | 
spite of you. I do not mean democratic v/ith a big "D," ' 
though I have a private conviction that you can not be | 
democratic with a small "d" long without becoming demo- i 
cratic with a big "D." Still that is just between ourselves. I 
The point is that when we have a consensus of opinion, when I 
we have this common counsel, then the legislative processes 1 
of this Government will be infinitely illuminated. * * * 

That is the ideal of a government like ours, and an inter- 
esting thing is that if you only talk about an idea that will 
not work long enough, everybody will see perfectly plainly 
that it will not work; whereas, if you do not talk about it, 
and do not have a great many people talk about it, you are 
in danger of having the people who handle it think that it 
will work. Man}^ minds are necessary to compound a 
workable method of life in a various and populous country; 
and as I think about the whole thing and picture the pur- 
poses, the infinitely difficult and complex purposes which 
we must conceive and carry out. not only does it minister 
to my own modesty, I hope, of opinion, but it also fills me 
with a very great enthusiasm. It is a splendid thing to be 
part of a f^reat wide-awake nation. It is a splendid thing 
to Ivnow that your o^vn strength is infinitely multiplied by 
the strength of other men who love the country as you do. 
It is a splendid thing to feel that the wholesome blood of a 
great country can be united in common purposes, and that 
by frankly looking one another in the face and taking coun- 



iFeb. 3l NATIONAL COMMERCE 77 

^'■sel with one another, prejudices will drop away, handsome 
understandings will arise, a universal spirit of service will be 
engendered, and that with this increased sense of community 
of purpose will come a vastly enhanced individual power of 
achievement; for we will be lifted by the whole mass of 
which we constitute a part. 

Have you never heard a great chorus of trained voices 
lift the voice of the prim.a donna as if it soared with easy 
grace above the whole melodious sound? It does not seem 
to come from the single throat that produces it. It seems 
as if it were the perfect accent and crown of the great chorus. 
So it ought to be with the statesman. So it ought to be with 
every man who tries to guide the counsels of a great nation. 
He should feel that his voice is lifted upon the chorus and 
that it is only the crown of the common theme. 

Issued by the Chamber of Commerce. 



23. A CONFUSED WORLD AT WAR 

(April 8, 1915) 

Address to the Conference of Methodist Protestant 
Church at Washington 

* * * These are days of very great perplexity, when a 
great cloud of trouble hangs and broods over the greater part 
of the world. It seems as if great, blind material forces had 
been released which had for long been held in leash and 
restraint. And yet, underneath that you can see the strong 
impulses of great ideals. 

It would be impossible for men to go through what men 
are going through on the battlefields of Europe — to go 
through the present dark night of their terrible struggle — if 
it were not that they saw, or thought that they saw, the 
broadening of light where the morning sun should come up, 
and believed that they were standing, each on his side of the 
contest, for some eternal principle for right. 

Then, aM about them, all about us, there sits the silent, 



78 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

waiting tribunal which is going to utter the ultimate judg- 
ment upon this struggle, the great tribunal of the opinion 
of the world, and I fancy I see, I hope that I see, I pray 
that it may be that I do truly see great spiritual forces lying 
waiting for the outcome of this thing to assert themselves, 
and asserting themselves even now, to enlighten our judg- 
ment and steady our spirits. No man is wise enough to 
pronounce judgment, but we can all hold our spirits in readi- 
ness to accept the truth when it dawns on us and is revealed 
to us in the outcome of this titanic struggle. 

You will see that it is only in such general terms that one 
can speak in the midst of a confused world, because, as I 
have already said, no man has the key to this confusion. 
No man can see the outcome, but every man can keep his 
own spirit prepared to contribute to the net result when the 
outcome displays itself. * * * 

New York Times, April 9, 191 5. 

24. AMERICA FIRST 

(April 20, 1915) 

Address at a Meeting of the Associated Press at 
New York 

I am deeply gratified by the generous reception you have 
accorded me. It makes me look back with a touch of regret 
to former occasions when I have stood in this place and 
enjoyed a greater liberty than is granted me to-day. There 
) have been times when I stood in this spot and said what I 
really thought, and I can not help praying that those days 
of indulgence may be accorded me again. I have come here 
to-day, of course, somewhat restrained by a sense of respon- 
sibility which I cannot escape. For I take the Associated 
Press very seriously. I know the enormous part that you 
play in the affairs not only of this country but of the world. 
You deal in the raw material of opinion and, if my convic- 
tions have any validity, opinion ultimately governs the world. 
It is, therefore, of very serious things that I think as I 



Apr. 20] AMERICA FIRST 79 

face this body of men. I do not think of you, however, as 
members of the Associated Press. I do not think of you 
as men of different parties or of different racial derivations 
or of different religious denominations. I want to talk to 
you as to my fellow citizens of the United States, for there 
are serious things which as fellow citizens we ought to con- 
sider. The times behind us, gentlemen, have been difficult 
enough; the times before us are likely to be more difficult 
still, because, whatever may be said about the present con- 
dition of the world's affairs, it is clear that they are drawing 
rapidly to a climax, and at the climax the test will come, not 
only for the nations engaged in the present colossal struggle 
— it will come to them, of course — ^but the test will come for 
us particularly. 

Do you realize that, roughly speaking, we are the only 
great Nation at present disengaged? I am not speaking, 
of course, with disparagement of the greatness of those 
nations in Europe which are not parties to the present war, 
but I am thinking of their close neighborhood to it. I am 
thinking how their lives much more than ours touch the 
very heart and stuff of the business, whereas we have rolling 
between us and those bitter days across the w^ater 3,000 
miles of cool and silent ocean. Our atmosphere is not yet 
charged with those disturbing elements which must permeate 
every nation of Europe. Therefore, is it not likely that' 
the nations of the world will some day turn to us for the^ 
cooler assessment of the elements engaged? I am not now' 
thinking so preposterous a thought as that we should sit in 
judgment upon them — no nation is fit to sit in judgment 
upon any • other nation — but that we shall some day have 
to assist in reconstructing the processes of peace. Our re- f 
sources are untouched; we are more and more becoming by 
the force of circumstances the mediating Nation of the world 
in respect of its finance. We must make up our minds what 
are the best things to do and what are the best ways to do 
them. We must put our money, our ener,gy, our enthusiasm, 
our sympathy into these things, and we must have our judg- 
ments prepared and our spirits chastened against the coming 
of that day. 

So that I am not speaking in a selfish spirit when I say 



8o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

that our whole duty, for the present at any rate, is summed 
J up in this m.otto, '\^merica first." Let us think of America 
before we think of Europe, in order that America may be 
j fit to be Europe's friend when the day of tested friendship 
I comes. The test of friendship is not now sympathy with 
j the one side or the other, but getting ready to help both 
sides when the struggle is over. The basis of neutrality, 
gentlemen, is not indifference; it is not self-interest. The 
j basis of neutrality is sympathy for mankind. It is fairness, 
I it is good will, at bottom. It is impartiality of spirit and of 
) judgment. I wish that all of our fellow citizens could realize 
Lthat. There is in some quarters a disposition to create dis- 
tempers in this body politic. Men are even uttering slanders 
against the United States, as if to excite her. Men are 
sajang that if we should go to war upon either side there 
would be a divided America — an abominable libel of igno- 
rance! America is not all of it vocal just now. It is vocal 
in spots, but I, for one, have a complete and abiding faith 
in that great silent body of Americans who are not standing 
up and shouting and expressing their opinions just now, 
but are waiting to find out and support the duty of America. 
I am just as sure of their solidity and of their loyalty and 
of their unanimity, if we act justly, as I am that the history 
of this country has at every crisis and turning point illus- 
trated this great lesson. 

We are the mediating Nation of the world. I do not 
mean that we undertake not to mind our own business and 
to mediate where other people are quarreling. I mean 
the word in a broader sense. We are compounded of the 
nations of the world; we mediate their blood, we mediate 
their traditions, we mediate their sentiments, their tastes, 
their passions, v/e are ourselves compounded of those things. 
We are, therefore, able to understand all nations; we are 
able to understand them in the compound, not separately, 
ao partisans, but unitedly as knowing and comprehending 
and embodying them all. It is in that sense that I mean 
that America is a mediating Nation. The opinion of x\merica, 
the action of America, is ready to turn, and free to turn, in 
any direction. Did you ever reflect upon how almost every 
other nation has through long centuries been headed in one 



Apr. 20] AMERICA FIRST 81 

direction? That is not true of the United States. The 
United States has no racial momentum. It has no history- 
back of it which makes it run all its energies and all its 
ambitions in one particular direction. And America is par- 
ticularly free in this, that she has no hampering ambitions 
as a world power. We do not want a foot of anybody's 
territory. If we have been obliged by circumstances, or 
have considered ourselves to be obliged by circumstances, in 
the past, to take territory which we otherwise would not 
have thought of taking, I believe I am right in saying that 
we have considered it our duty to administer that territory, 
not for ourselves but for the people living in it, and to put 
this burden upon our consciences — not to think that this 
thing is ours for our use, but to regard ourselves as trustees 
of the great business for those to whom it does really belong, 
trustees ready to hand it over to the cestui que trust at any 
time when the business seems to make that possible and 
feasible. That is what I mean by saying we have no ham- 
pering ambitions. We do not want anything that does not 
belong to us. Is not a nation in that position free to serve 
other nations, and is not a nation like that ready to form 
some part of the assessing opinion of the world? 

My interest in the neutrality of the United States is not 
the petty desire to keep out of trouble. To judge by my 
experience, I have never been able to keep out of trouble. I 
have never looked for it, but I have always found it. I do 
not v/ant to walk around trouble. If any man wants a scrap 
that is an interesting scrap and worth while, I am his man. 
I v/arn him that he is not going to draw me into the scrap 
for his advertisement, but if he is looking for trouble that 
is the trouble of men in general and I can help a little, why, 
then, I am in for it. But I am interested in neutrality be-l 
cause there is something so much greater to do than fight; 
there is a distinction waiting for this Nation that no nation\ 
has ever yet got. That is the distinction of absolute self- 
control and self-mastery. Whom do you admire most among 
your friends? The irritable man? The man out of whom 
you can get a "rise" without trying? The man who will 
fight at the drop of the hat, whether he knows what the hat 
is dropped for or not? Don't you admire and don't you 



82 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

fear, if you have to contest with him, the self-mastered man 
who watches you with calm eye and comes in only when you 
have carried the thing so far that you must be disposed of? 
That is the m.an you respect. That is the m.an who, you 
know, has at bottom a much more fundamental and ter- 
rible courage than the irritable, fighting man. Now, I covet 
for America this splendid courage of reser\^e moral force, 
and I wanted to point out to you gentlemen simply this: 

There is news and news. There is what is called news 
from Turtle Bay that turns out to be falsehood, at any 
rate in what it is said to signify, but which, if you could 
get the Nation to believe it true, might disturb our equi- 
librium and our self-possession. We ought not to deal in 
stuff of that kind. We ought not to permit that sort of 
thing to use up the electrical energy of the wires, because 
its energy is malign, its energy is not of the truth, its energy 
is of mischief. It is possible to sift truth. I have known 
some things to go out on the wires as true when there was 
only one man or one group of men who could have told the 
originators of that report whether it was true or not, and they 
were not asked whe^er it was true or not for fear it might 
not be true. That sort of report ought not to go out over 
the Vvdres. There is generally, if not always, somebody who 
knows whether the thing is so or not, and in these' days, 
above all other days, we ought to take particular pains to 
resort to the one small group of men, or to the one man if 
there be but one, who knows whether those things are true 
or not. The world ought to know the truth; the world 
ought not at this period of unstable equilibrium to be dis- 
turbed by rumor, ought not to be disturbed by imaginative 
combinations of circumstances, or, rather, by circumstances 
stated in combination which do not belong in combination. 
You gentlemen, and gentlemen engaged like 3'ou, are holding 
the balances in your hand. This unstable equilibrium rests 
upon scales that are in your hands. For the food of opinion, 
as I began by saying, is the news of the day. I have 
known many a man to go off at a tangent on information 
that was not reliable. Indeed, that describes the majority of 
men. The world is held stable by the man who waits for the 
next day to find out whether the report was true or not. 



Apr 2oJ AMERICA FIRST S 



We cannot afford, therefore, to let the rumors of irre- 
sponsible persons and origins get into the atmosphere of 
thf' United States We are trustees for what I venture to 
say IS the greatest heritage ih?.t any nation ever had, the 
love of justice and righteousness and human liberty. For, 
fundamentally, those are the things to which America is 
addicted and to which she is devoted. There are groups of 
selfish men in the United States, there are coteries, where 
sinister things are purposed, but the great heart of the 
American people is just as sound and true as it ever was. 
And it is a single heart; it is the heart of America. It 
is not a heart made up of sections selected out of other 
countries. 

What I try to remind myself of every day when I am 
almost overcome by perplexities, what I try to remember, 
is what the people at home are thinking about. I try to put 
myself in the place of the man who does not know all the 
things that I know and ask myself what he would like the 
policy of this country to be. Not the talkative man, not 
the partisan man, not the man who remembers first that 
he is a Republican or a Democrat, or that his parents were 
German or English, but the man who remembers first that 
the whole destiny of modern affairs centers largely upon his 
being an American first of all. If I permitted myself to be a | 
partisan in this present struggle, I would be unworthy to ' 
represent you. If I permitted myself to forget the people 
who are not partisans, I would be unworthy to be your 
spokesman. I am not sure that I am worthy to represent : 
you, but I do claim this degree of worthiness — that before i 
everything else I love America. 

Wllite House Pamphlet. 

25. THE LAWS OF NEUTRALITY 

(April 21, 1915) 

Despatch Sent Through Secretary Bryan to Germany 

* * * In the first place, this Government has at no time 
and in no manner yielded any one of its rights as a neutral 



84 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

to any of the present belligerents. It has acknowledged, as 
a matter of course, the right of visit and search and the 
right to apply the rules of contraband of war t6 articles of 
commerce. It has, indeed, insisted upon the use of visit and 
search as an absolutely necessary safeguard against mistak- 
ing neutral vessels for vessels o"v^Tied b}^ an enemy and 
against mistaking legal cargoes for illegal. It has admitted 
also the right of blockade if actually exercised and effectively 
maintained. These are merely the well-known limitations 
which war places upon neutral commerce on the high seas. 
But nothing beyond these has it conceded. I call Your 
Excellency's attention to this, notwithstanding it is already 
known to all the world as a consequence of the publication 
of our correspondence in regard to these matters with sev- 
eral of the belligerent nations, because I can not assume 
that you have official cognizance of it. 

In the second place, this Government attempted to se- 
cure from the German and British Governments mutual 
concessions with regard to the measures those Governments 
respectively adopted for the interruption of trade on the 
hiizh seas. This it did, not of right, but merely as exer- 
cising the privileges of a sincere friend of both parties and 
as indicating its im.partial good will. The attempt was un- 
successful; but I regret that Your Excellency did not deem 
it worthy of mention in modification of the impressions 
you expressed. We had hoped that this act on our part had 
shown our spirit in these times of distressing war as our 
diplomatic correspondence had shown our steadfast refusal 
to acknowledge the right of any belligerent to alter the 
accepted rules of war at sea in so far as they affect the rights 
and interests of neutrals. 

In the third place, I note with sincere regret that, in dis- 
cussing the sale and exportation of arms by citizens of the 
United States to the enemies of Germany, Your Excellency 
seems to be under the impression that it was within the 
choice of the Government of the United States, notwith- 
standing its professed neutrality and its diligent efforts to 
maintain it in other particulars, to inhibit this trade, and 
that its failure to do so manifested an unfar attitude toward 
Germany. This Government holds, as I believe Your Ex- 



Apr. 2i] THE LAWS OF NEUTRALITY 85 

cellency is aware, and as it is constrained to hold in view of 
the present^indisputable doctrines of accepted international 
law, that any change in its own laws of neutrality during 
the progress of a war which would affect unequally the 
relations of the United States with the nations at war would 
be an unjustifiable departure from the principle of strict 
neutrality by which it has consistently sought to direct its 
actions, and I respectfully submit that none of the circum- 
stances urged in Your Excellency's memorandum alters the 
principle involved. The placing of an embargo on the trade 
in arm.s at the present time would constitute such a change 
and be a direct violation of the neutrality of the United 
States. It will, I feel assured, be clear to Your Excellency 
that, holding this view and considering itself in honor bound 
by it, it is out of the question for this Government to con- 
sider such a course. * * * 

Department of State, White Book, No. I, 74. 

26. CITIZENS OF FOREIGN BIRTH 

(May 10, 1915) 

Address to Naturalized Citizens at Convention Hall, 
Philadelphia 

It warms my heart that you should give me such a recep- 
tion; but it is not of myself that I wish to think to-night, 
but of those who have just become citizens of the LTnited 
States. 

This is the only country in the world which experiences 
this constant and repeated rebirth. Other countries depend 
upon the multiplication of their own native people. This 
country is constantly drinking strength out of new sources 
by the voluntar}' association with it of great bodies of strong 
men and fop^.-ard-lookins; women out of other lands. And 
so by the gift of the free will of independent people it is 
being constantly renewed from generation to generation by 
the same process by which it was originally created. It is 
as if humanity had determined to see to it that this great 



86 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

Nation, founded for the benefit of humanity, should not lack 
for the allegiance of the people of the world. » 

You have just taken an oath of allegiance to the United 
States. Of allegiance to whom? Of allegiance to no one, 
unless it be God — certainly not of allegiance to those who 
temporarily represent this great Government. You have 
taken an oath of allegiance to a great ideal, to a great body 
of principles, to a great hope of the human race. You have 
said, "We are going to America not only to earn a living, 
not only to seek the things which it was more difficult to 
obtain where we were born, but to help forward the great i 
enterprises of the human spirit — to let men know that every- i 
where in the world there are m.en who will cross strange i 
oceans and go where a speech is spoken which is alien to i 
them if they can but satisfy their quest for what their spirits : 
crave; knowing that whatever the speech there is but one 1 
longing and utterance of the human heart, and that is for j 
liberty and justice.'' And while you bring all countries with ; 
you, you come with a purpose of leaving all other countries i 
behind you — bringing what is best of their spirit, but not I 
looking over your shoulders and seeking to perpetuate what ! 
you intended to leave behind in them. I certainly would not j 
be one even to suggest that a man cease to love the home j 
of his birth and the nation of his origin — these things are ! 
very sacred and ought not to be put out of our hearts — ' 
but it is one thing to love the place where you were born 1 
and it is another thing to dedicate yourself to the place to 1 
which you go. You can not dedicate yourself to America ] 
unless you becom.e in every respect and with every purpose | 
of your will thorough Americans. You can not become 
Americans if you think of yourselves in groups. America 
does not consist of groups. A man who thinks of himself as 
belonging to a particular national group in America has not 
yet become an American, and the man who goes among you 
to trade upon your nationality is no worthy son to live under 
the Stars and Stripes. 

My urgent advice to you would be, not only always to 
think first of America, but always, also, to think first of 
humanity. You do not love humanity if you seek to divide 
humanity into jealous camps. Humanity can be welded to- 



May lo] CITIZENS OF FOREIGN BIRTH 87 

gether only by love, by sympathy, by justice, not by jeal- 
ousy and hatred. I am sorry for the man who seeks to make 
personal capital out of the passions of his fellow-men. He 
has lost the touch and ideal of America, for America was 
created to unite mankind by those passions which lift and 
not by the passions which separate and debase. We came 
to America, either ourselves or in the persons of our an- 
cestors, to better the ideals of men, to make them see finer 
things than they had seen before, to get rid of the things 
that divide and to make sure of the things that unite. It 
was but an historical accident no doubt that this great country 
was called the "United States"; yet I am very thankful that 
it has that word ''United" in its title, and the man who seeks 
to divide man from man, group from group, interest from 
interest in this great Union is striking at its very heart. 

It is a very interesting circumstance to me, in thinking 
of those of you who have just sworn allegiance to this great 
Government, that you were drawn across the ocean by some 
beckoning finger of hope, by some belief, by some vision of 
a new kind of justice, by some expectation of a better kind 
of life. No doubt you have been disappointed in some of 
us. Some of us are very disappointing. No doubt you have 
found that justice in the United States goes only with a 
pure heart and a right purpose as it does everywhere else in 
the world. No doubt what you found here did not seem 
touched for you, after all, with the complete beauty of the 
ideal which you had conceived beforehand. But remember 
this: If we had grown at all poor in the ideal, you brought 
some of it with you. A man does not go out to seek the thing 
that is not in him. A man does not hope for the thing he 
does not believe in, and if some of us have forgotten what 
America believed in, you, at any rate, imported in your own 
hearts a renewal of the belief. That is the reason that I, for 
one, make you welcome. If I have in any degree forgotten 
what America was intended for, I will thank God if you will 
remind me. I was born in America. You dreamed dreams 
of what America was to be, and I hope you brought the 
dreams with you. No man that does not see visions will 
ever realize any high hope or undertake any high enterprise. 
Just because you brought dreams with you, America is more 



88 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

likely to realize dreams such as you brought. You are 
enriching us if you came expecting us to be better than 
we are. 

See, my friends, what that means. It means that Ameri- 
cans must have a consciousness different from the conscious- 
ness of every other nation in the world. I am not saying 
this with even the slightest thought of criticism of other 
nations. You know how it is with a family. A family gets 
centered on itself if it is not careful and is less interested in 
the neighbors than it is in its own members. So a nation 
that is not constantly renewed out of new sources is apt to 
have the narrow^ness and prejudice of a family; whereas, 
America must have this consciousness, that on all sides it 
touches elbows and touches hearts with all the nations of 
mankind. The example of America must be a special exam- 
ple. The example of America must be the example not 
merely of peace because it will not fight, but of peace because 
peace is the healing and elevating influence of the world and 
strife is not. There is such a thing as a man being too 
proud to fight. There is such a thing as a nation being so 
right that it does not need to convince others by force that 
it is right. 

You have come into this great Nation voluntarily seeking 
something that we have to give, and all that we have to 
give is this: We can not exempt you from work. No man 
is exempt from w^ork anywhere in the world. We can not 
exempt you from the strife and the heartbreaking burden of 
the struggle of the day — that is common to mankind every- 
where; we can not exempt you from the loads that you must 
carry. We can only make them light by the spirit in which 
they are carried. That is the spirit of hope, it is the spirit of 
liberty, it is the spirit of justice. 

WTien I was asked, therefore, by the INIayor and the com- 
mittee that accompanied him to come up from Washington 
to meet this great company of newly admitted citizens, I 
could not decline the invitation. I ought not to be away 
from Washington, and yet I feel that it has renewed my ' 
spirit as an American to be here. In Washington men tell 
you so many things every day that are not so, and I like to 
come and stand in the presence of a great body of my fellow- 



May lo] CITIZENS OF FOREIGN BIRTH 89 

citizens, whether they have been my fellow-citizens a long 
time or a short time, and drink, as it were, out of the common 
fountains with them and go back feeling what you have so 
generously given me — the sense of your support and of the 

i living vitality in your hearts of the great ideals which have 
made America the hope of the world. 
White House Pamphlet. 

17. SINKING OF THE ''LUSITANIA" 

(May 13, 1915) 

Despatch of Protest through Secretary Bryan to 
Germany 

* * * Recalling the humane and enlightened attitude 
hitherto assumed by the Imperial German Government in 
matters of international right, and particularly with regard 
to the freedom of the seas; having learned to recognize the 
German views and the German influence in the field of 
international obligation as always engaged upon the side of 
justice and humanity; and having understood the instruc- 
tions of the Imperial German Government to its naval com- 
manders to be upon the same plane of humane action pre- 
scribed by the naval codes of other nations, the Government 
of the United States was loath to believe — it can not now 
bring itself to believe — that these acts, so absolutely con- 
trary to the rules, the practices, and the spirit of modem 
• warfare, could have the countenance or sanction of that 
I great Government. It feels it to be its duty, therefore, to 
I address the Imperial German Government concerning them 
with the utmost frankness and in the earnest hope that it is 
not mistaken in expecting action on the part of the Imperial 
German Government which will correct the unfortunate 
impressions which have been created and vindicate once 
more the position of that Government with regard to the 
sacred freedom of the seas. 

The Government of the United States has been apprised 
that the Imperial German Government considered themselves 
to be obliged by the extraordinary circumstances of the 



90 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 15 

present war and the measures adopted by their adversaries 
in seeking to cut Germany off from all commerce, to adopt 
methods of retaliation which go much beyond the ordinary 
methods of warfare at sea, in the proclamation of a war 
zone from which they have warned neutral ships to keep 
away. This Government has already taken occasion to in- 
form the Imperial German Government that it can not admit 
ihe adoption of such measures or such a warning of danger 
to operate as in any degree an abbreviation of the rights of 
American shipmasters or of American citizens bound on law- 
ful errands as passengers on merchant ships of belligerent 
nationality; and that it must hold the Imperial German 
Government to a strict accountability for any infringement 
of those rights, intentional or incidental. It does not under- 
stand the Imperial German Government to question those 
rights. It assumes, on the contrary, that the Imperial Gov- 
ernment accept, as of course, the rule that the lives of non- 
combatants, whether they be of neutral citizenship or citi- 
zens of one of the nations at war, can not lawfully or right- 
fully be put in jeopardy by the capture or destruction of an 
unarmed merchantman, and recognize also, as all other na- 
tions do, the obligation to take the usual precaution of visit 
and search to ascertain whether a suspected merchantman is 
in fact of belligerent nationality or is in fact carrying con- 
traband of war under a neutral flag. * * * 

Department of State, White Book, No. I, 75. 



28. WHAT THE FLAG MEANS 

(June 14, 191 5) 

Address at Flag Day Exercises, Washington 

I know of nothing more difficult than to render an adequate 
tribute to the emblem of our nation. For those of us who 
have shared that nation's life and felt the beat of its pulse 
it must be considered a matter of impossibility to express 
the great things which that emblem embodies. I venture to 
say that a great many things are said about the flag which 
very few people stop to analyze. For me the flag does not 



Jjune 14] WHAT THE FLAG MEANS 91 

express a mere body of vague sentiment. The flag of the 
United States has not been created by rhetorical sentences 
in declarations of independence and in bills of rights. It has 
been created by the experience of a great people, and nothing 
is written upon it that has not been written by their life. 
It is the embodiment, not of a sentiment, but of a histor}% 
and no man can rightly serve under that flag who has not 
caught some of the meaning of that history. 

Experience, ladies and gentlemen, is made by men and 
women. National experience is the product of those who do 
the living under that flag. It is their living that has created 
its significance. You do not create the meaning of a national 
life by any literary exposition of it, but by the actual daily 
endeavors of a great people to do the tasks of the day and 
live up to the ideals of honesty and righteousness and just 
conduct. And as we think of these things, our tribute is 
to those men who have created this experience. Many of 
them are known by name to all the world, — statesmen, sol- 
diers, merchants, masters of industry, men of letters and of 
thought who have coined our hearts into action or into 
words. Of these men we feel that they have showTi us the 
way. They have not been afraid to go before. They have 
known that the}^ were speaking the thoughts of a great people 
w^hen they led that great people along the paths of achieve- 
ment. There was not a single swashbuckler among them. 
They were men of sober, quiet thought, the more effective 
because there was no bluster in it. They were men who 
thought along the lines of duty, not along the lines of self- 
aggrandizement. They were men, in short, who thought of 
the people whom they served and not of themselves. 

But while we think of these men and do honor to them as 
to those who have shown us the way, let us not forget that 
the real experience and life of a nation lies with the great 
multitude of unkno\\Ti men. It lies with those men whose 
names are never in the headlines of newspapers, those men 
who know the heat and pain and desperate loss of hope that 
sometimes comes in the great struggle of daily life; not the 
men who stand on the side and comment, not the men who 
merely try to interpret the great struggle, but the men who 
are engaged in the struggle. They constitute the body of the 



92 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 

nation. This flag is the essence of their daily endeavors. 
This flag does not express any more than what they are and 
what they desire to be. 

As I think of the life of this great nation it seems to me 
that we sometimes look to the wrong places for its sources. 
We look to the noisy places, where men are talking in the 
market place; we look to where men are expressing their 
individual opinions; we look to where partisans are express- 
ing passion: instead of trying to attune our ears to that 
voiceless mass of men who merely go about their daily tasks, 
try to be honorable, try to serve the people they love, try to 
live worthy of the great communities to which they belong. 
These are the breath of the nation's nostrils; these are the 
sinew of its mJght. 

How can any man presume to interpret the emblem of the 
United States, the emblem of what we would fain be among 
the family of the nations, and find it incumbent upon us to 
be in the daily round of routine duty? This is Flag Day, but 
that only means that it is a day when we are to recall the 
things which we should do every day of our lives. There are 
no days of special patriotism. There are no days when we 
should be more patriotic than on other days. We celebrate 
the Fourth of July merely because the great enterprise of 
liberty was started on the Fourth of July in America, but 
the great enterprise of liberty was not begun in America. 
It is illustrated by the blood of thousands of martyrs who 
lived and died before the great experiment on this side of the 
water. The Fourth of July merely marks the day when we 
consecrated ourselves as a nation to this high thing which 
we pretend to serve. The benefit of a day like this is merely 
in turning awa}^ from the things that distract us, turning 
away from the things that touch us personally and absorb our 
interest in the hours of daily work. We remind ourselves of 
those things that are greater than we are, of those principles 
by which we believe our hearts to be elevated, of the more 
difficult things that we must undertake in these days of 
perplexity when a man's judgment is safest only when it 
follows the line of principle. 

I am solemnized in the presence of such a day. I would 
not undertake to speak your thoughts. You must interpret 



June 14] WHAT THE FLAG MEANS 93 

them for me. But I do feel that back, not only of every 
public official, but of every man and woman of the United 
States, there marches that great host which has brought us 
to the present day; the host that has never forgotten the 
vision which it saw at the birth of the nation ; the host vrhich 
always responds to the dictates of hum.anity and of liberty; 
the host that will always constitute the strength and the great 
body of friends of every man v/ho does his duty to the United 
States. 

I am sorry that you do not wear a little flag of the Union 
every day instead of some days. I can only ask you, if you 
lose tlie physical emblem, to be sure that you wear it in your 
heart, and the heart of America shall interpret the heart of 
the world. 

White House Pamphlet. 



29. PREPAREDNESS FOR DEFENSE 
(October 6, 19 15) 

Address to the Civilian Advisory Board of the Navy 
AT THE White House 

* * * I think the whole nation is convinced that we ought 
to be prepared, not for war, but for defense, and very ade- 
quately prepared, and that the preparation for defense is not 
merely a technical matter, that it is not a matter that the 
Army and Navy alone can take care of, but a matter in 
which we must have the cooperation of the best brains and 
knowledge of the country, outside the official service of the 
Government, as well as inside. 

For my part, I feel that it is only in the spirit of a tme 
democracy that we get together to lend such voluntary aid, 
the sort of aid that comes from interest, from a knowledge of 
the varied circumstances that are involved in handling a 
nation. * * ^ 

I do not have to expound it to you; you know as well as 
I do the spirit of America. The spirit of America is one of 
peace, but one of independence. It is a spirit that is pro- 



I 



94 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1915 1 

foundly concerned with peace, because it can express itself 
best only in peace. It is the spirit of peace and good-will 
and of human freedom; but it is also the spirit of a nation 
that is self-conscious, that knows and loves its mission in the 
w^orld, and that knows that it must command the respect of 
the world. 

So it seems to me that we are not worldng as those who 
would change anything of America, but only as those who 
would safeguard everything in America. * * * 

New York Times, Oct. 7, 19 15. 



YEAR 1916 

30. WHAT IS PAN-AMERICANISM? 

(January 6, 19 16) 

Address to Pan-American Scientific Congress at 
Washington 

It was a matter of sincere regret vdth me that I was not 
in the city to extend the greetings of the Government to this 
distinguished body, and I am very happy that I have re- 
turned in time at least to extend to it my fehcitations upon 
the unusual interest and success of its proceedings. I wish 
that it might have been my good fortune to be present at the 
sessions and be instructed by the papers that were read. I 
have somewhat become inured to scientific papers in the 
course of a long experience, but I have never ceased to be in- 
structed and to enjoy them. 

The sessions of this Congress have been looked forward 
to with the greatest interest throughout this country, because 
there is no more certain evidence of intellectual life than the 
desire of men of all nations to share their thoughts with one 
another. 

I have been told so much about the proceedings of this 
Congress that I feel that I can congratulate you upon the 
increasing sense of comradeship and intimate intercourse 
which has marked its sessions from day to day; and it is a 
very happy circumstance in our view that this, perhaps the 
most vital and successful of the meetings of this Congress, 
should have occurred in the Capital of our own country, be- 
cause we should wish to regard this as the universal place 
where ideas worth while are exchanged and shared. The 
drawing together of the Americas, ladies and gentlemen, has 
t 95 



96 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

long been dreamed of and desired. It is a matter of peculiar 
gratification, therefore, to see this great thing happen; to 
see the Americas drawing together, and not drawing together 
upon any insubstantial foundation of mere sentiment. 

After all, even friendship must be based upon a perception 
of common sympathies, of common interests, of common 
ideals, and of common purposes. Men cannot be friends un- 
less they intend the sam.e things, and the Americas have 
more and more realized that in all essential particulars they 
intend the same thing vdth regard to their thought and their 
life and tlieir activities. To be privileged, therefore, to see 
this drawing together in friendship and comm.union, based 
upon these solid foundations, affords everyone w^ho looks on 
with open eyes peculiar satisfaction and joy; and it has 
seemed to me that the language of science, the language of 
impersonal thought, the language of those who think, not 
along the lines of individual interest but along what are in- 
tended to be the direct and searching lines of truth itself, 
was a very fortunate language in which to express this com- 
munity of interest and of sympathy. Science affords an 
international language just as commerce also affords a uni- 
versal language, because in each instance there is a universal 
purpose, a universal general plan of action, and it is a pleas- 
ing thought to those who have had something to do with 
scholarship that scholars have had a great deal to do with | 
sowing the seeds of friendship between nation and nation. " 
Truth recognizes no national boundaries. Truth permits no 
racial prejudices; and when men come to know each other 
and to recognize equal intellectual strength and equal intel- 
lectual sincerity and a common intellectual purpose, some of 
the best foundations of friendship are already laid. 

But, ladies and gentlemen, our thought cannot pause at 
the artificial boundaries of the fields of science and of com- 
merce. All boundaries that divide life into sections and in- 
terests are artificial, because life is all of a piece. You 
cannot treat part of it without by implication and indirection 
treating all of it, and the field of science is not to be distin- | 
guished from the field of life any more than the field of I 
commerce is to be distinguished from the general field of li 
life. No one who reflects upon the progress of science or ;i 



Jan. 6] WHAT IS PAN-AMERICANISM? 97 

the spread of the arts of peace or tlie extension and perfec- 
tion of any of the practical arts of life can fail to see that 
there is only one atmosphere that these things can breathe, 
and that is an atmosphere of mutual confidence and of peace 
and of ordered political life among the nations. Amidst 
war and revolution even the voice of science must for the 
most part be silent, and revolution tears up the very roots 
of everything that makes life go steadily forward and the 
light grow from generation to generation. For nothing stirs 
passion like political disturbance, and passion is the enemy 
of truth. 

These things were realized with peculiar vividness and said 
with unusual eloquence in a recent conference held in this 
city for the purpose of considering the financial relations 
between the two continents of America, because it was per- 
ceived that financiers can do nothing without the coopera- 
tion of governments, and that if merchants would deal with 
one another, laws must agree with one another; that you 
cannot make laws vary without making them contradict, and 
that amidst contradictory laws the easy flow of commercial 
intercourse is impossible, and that, therefore, a financial 
congress naturally led to all the inferences of politics. For 
politics I conceive to be nothing more than the science of 
the ordered progress of society along the lines of greatest 
usefulness and convenience to itself. I have never in my 
own mind admitted the distinction between the other de- 
partments of life and politics. Some people devote them- 
selves so exclusively to politics that they forget there is any 
other part of life, and so soon as they do they become that 
thing which is described as a "mere politician." Statesman- 
ship begins where these connections so unhappily lost are 
reestablished. The statesman stands in the midst of life 
to interpret life in political action. 

The conference to which I have referred marked the 
consciousness of the two Americas that economically they are 
very dependent upon one another, that tliey have a great 
deal that is desirable they should exchange and share with 
one another, that they have kept unnaturally and unfortu- 
nately separated and apart when they had a manifest and 
obvious community of interest; and the object of that con- 



9S ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

ference was to ascertain the practical means by which the 
commercial and practical intercourse of the continents 
could be quickened and facilitated. And where events move 
statesmen, if they be not indifferent or be not asleep, must 
think and act. 

For my own part I congratulate myself upon living in a 
time when these things, always susceptible of intellectual 
demonstration, have begun to be very widely and universally 
appreciated, and when the statesmen of the two American 
continents have more and more come into candid, trustful, 
mutual conference, comparing views as to the practical and 
friendly way of helping one another, and of setting forward 
every handsome enterprise on this side of the Atlantic. 

But these gentlemen have not conferred without realizing 
that back of all the material community of interest of which 
I have spoken there lies and must lie a community of political 
interest. I have been told a very interesting fact — I hope it 
is true — that while this Congress has been discussing science, 
it has been, in spite of itself, led into the feeling that behind 
the science there was some inference with regard to politics, 
and that if the Americans were to be united in thought they 
must in some degree sympathetically be united in action. 
What these statesmen, v/ho have been conferring from month 
to month in Washington, have come to realize, that back of 
the community of material interest there is a community of 
political interest. 

I hope I can make clear to you in what sense I use these 
words. I do not mean a mere partnership in the things that 
are expedient. I mean what I was trying to indicate a few 
moments ago, that you cannot separate politics from these 
things, that you cannot have reaJ intercourse of any kind 
amidst political jealousies, which is only another way of say- 
ing that you cannot commune unless you are friends, and 
that friendship is based upon your political relations with 
each other perhaps more than upon any other kind of re- 
lationship between nations. If nations are politically sus- 
picious of one another, all their intercourse is embarrassed. 
That is the reason, I take it, if it be true, as I hope it is, 
that your thoughts even during this Congress, though the 
questions you are called upon to consider are apparently so 



Jan. 6] WHAT IS PAN-AMERICANISM? 99 

foreign to politics, have again and again been dra\\Ti back 
to the poHtical inferences. The object of American states- 
manship on the two continents is to see to it that American 
friendship is founded on a rock. 

The Monroe Doctrine was proclaimed by the United States 
on her own authority. It always has been maintained and 
always will be maintained upon her own responsibility. But 
the Monroe Doctrine demanded merely that European Gov- 
ernments should not attempt to extend their political systems 
to this side of the Atlantic. It did not disclose the use which 
the United States intended to make of her power on this side 
of the Atlantic. It was a hand held up in warning, but there 
was no promise in it of what America was going to do with 
the implied and partial protectorate which she apparently 
was trying to set up on this side of the water; and I believe 
you will sustain me in the statement that it has been fears 
and suspicions on this score w^hich have hitherto prevented 
the greater intimacy and confidence and trust betw^een the 
Americas. The States of America have not been certain 
what the United States would do with her power. That 
doubt must be removed. And latterly there has been a very 
frank interchange of views between the authorities in Wash- 
ington and those who represented the other States of this 
hemisphere, an interchange of views charming and hopeful, 
because based upon an increasingly sure appreciation of the 
spirit in which they were undertaken. These gentlemen have 
seen that if America is to come into her o";vn, into her 
legitimate own, in a world of peace and order, she must 
establish the foundations of amity so that no one will here- 
after doubt them. 

I hope and I believe that this can be accomplished. These 
conferences have enabled me to foresee how it will be ac- 
complished. It will be accomplished in the first place, by 
the States of America uniting in guaranteeing to each other 
absolutely political independence and territorial integrity. 
In the second place, and as a necessary corollary to that, 
guaranteeing the agreement to settle all pending boundary 
disputes as soon as possible and by amicable process; by 
agreeing that all disputes among themselves, should they 
unhappily arise, will be handled by patient, impartial in- 



TOO ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

vestigation, and settled by arbitration; and the agreement 
necessary to the peace of the Americas, that no State of 
either continent will permit revolutionary e>qDeditions against 
another State to be fitted out on its territory, and that they 
will prohibit the exportation of the munitions of war for 
the purpose of supplying revolutionists against neighboring 
Governments. 

You see what our thought is, gentlemen, not only the 
international peace of America but the domestic peace of 
America. If American States are constantly in ferment, if 
any of them are constantly in ferment, there will be a stand- 
ing threat to their relations with one another. It is just as 
much to our Interest to assist each other to the orderly proc- 
esses within our own borders as it is to orderly processes in 
our controversies with one another. These are very prac- 
tical suggestions which have sprung up in the minds of 
thoughtful men, and I, for my part, believe that they are 
going to lead the way to something that America has prayed 
for for many a generation. For they are based, in the first 
place, so far as the stronger States are concerned, upon the 
handsome principle of self-restraint and respect for the rights 
of everybody. They are based upon the principles of abso- 
lute political equality among the States, equality of right, 
not eauality of indulgence. They are based, in short, upon 
the solid eternal foundations of justice and humanity. No 
man can turn away from these things without turning away 
from the hope of the w^orld. These are things, ladies and 
gentlemen, for which the world has hoped and waited with 
prayerful heart. God grant that it may be granted to 
America to lift this light on high for the illumination of the 
world. jsfew York Times, Jan. 7, 19 16. 

31. NEED OF AN ARMY AND NAVY 

(January 27, 19 16) 

Address at New York 

* * * I hear a great many thinc:5 predicted about the end 
of the war, but I do not know what is going to happen at 



Jan. 27] NEED OF AN ARMY AND NAVY loi 

the end of the war; and neither do you. There are two 
diametrically opposed views as to immigration. Some men 
tell us that at least a million men are going to leave the 
country and others tell us that many millions are going to 
rush into it. Neither party knows what they are talking 
about, and I am one of those prudent individuals who w'ould 
really like to know the facts before he forms an opinion; 
not out of wisdom but out of prudence. I have lived long 
enough to know that if I do not, the facts will get away with 
me. I have come to have a great and wholesome respect 
for the facts. I have had to yield to them sometimes before 
I saw them coming and that has led me to keep a weather eye 
open in order that I may see them coming. There is so much 
to understand that we have not the data to comprehend that 
I lor one would not dare, so far as my advice is concerned, 
to leave th^ Government without the adequate means of 
inquiry — but that is another parenthesis. 

\Vhat I am trying to impress upon you now is that the 
arcumstances of the world to-day • are not W'hat they were 
yesterday, or ever were in any of our yesterdays. And it is 
not certain what they will be to-morrow. I can not tell you 
what the international relations of this country will be to- 
morrow, and I use the w^ord literally; and I would not dare 
keep silent and let the country suppose that to-morrow was 
certain to be as bright as to-day. America will never be the 
aggressor. America will ahvays seek to the last point at 
which her honor is involved to avoid the things which disturb 
the peace of the world; but America does not control the 
circumstances of the world, and we must be sure that we are 
faithful servants of those things which we love, and are ready 
to defend them against every contingency that may affect or 
impair them. 

And, as I w^as saying a moment ago, we must seek the 
means which are consistent with the principles of our lives. 
It goes without saying, though apparently it is necessary 
to say it to some excited persons, that one thing that this 
country never will endure is a system that can be called 
militarism. But militarism consists in this, gentlemen: It 
consists in preparing a great machine whose only use is for 
war and giving it no use upon which to expend itself. Men 



102 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

who are in charge of edged tools and bidden to prepare them 
for exact and scientific use grow very impatient if they are 
not permitted to use them, and I do not beheve that the 
creation of such an instrument is an insurance of peace. I 
believe that it involves the danger of all the impulses that 
skilful persons have to use the things that they know how 
to use. 

But we do not have to do that. America is always going 
to use her Army in two ways. She is going to use it for the 
purposes of peace, and she is going to use it as a nucleus for 
expansion into those things which she does believe in, namely, 
the preparation of her citizens to take care of themselves. 
There are two sides to the question of preparation; there is 
not merely the military side, there is the industrial side; and 
the ideal which I have in mind is this: We ought to have in 
this country a great system of industrial and voc'ational edu- 
cation under Federal guidance and with Federal aid, in 
which a very large percentage of the youth of this country 
will be given training in the skilful use and application of 
the principles of science in manufacture and business; and 
it will be perfectly feasible and highly desirable to add to 
that and combine with it such a training in the mechanism 
and care and use of arms, in the sanitation of camps, in the 
simpler forms of maneuver and organization, as will make 
these same men at one and the same time industrially efficient 
and immediately serviceable for national defense. The 
point about such a system will be that its emphasis will lie 
on the industrial and civil side of life, and that, like all the 
rest of America, the use of force will only be in the back- 
ground and as the last resort. Men will think first of their 
families and their daily w^ork, of their service in the economic 
ranks of the country, of their efficiency as artisans, and 
only last of all of their serviceability to the Nation as sol- 
diers and men at arms. That is the ideal of x\merica. 

But, gentlemen, you can not create such a s}/stem over- 
night; you can not create such a system rapidly. It has got 
to be built up, and I hope it will be built up, by slow^ and 
effective stages; and there is much to be done in the mean- 
time. We must see to it that a sufficient bod}^ of citizens is 
given the kind of training which will make them efficient now 



Jan. 2 7] NEED OF AN ARMY AND NAVY 103 

if called into the field in case of necessitj^ It is discreditable 
to this country, gentlemen, for this is a country full of 
intelligent men, that we should have exhibited to the world 
the example we have sometimes exhibited to it, of stupid 
and brutal w^ste of force. Think of asking men who can 
be easily trained to come into the field, crude, ignorant, in- 
experienced, and merely furnishing the stuff for camp fever 
and the bullets of the enemy. The sanitary experience of 
our Army in the Spanish-American Vv-ar was merely an in- 
dictment of America's indifference to the manifest lessons 
of experience in the matter of ordinary, careful preparation. 
We have got the men to waste, but God forbid that we should 
waste them. Men who go as efficient instruments of national 
honor into the field afford a very handsome spectacle indeed. 
Men who go in crude and ignorant boys only indict those 
in authority for stupidity and neglect. So it seems to me 
that it is our manifest duty to have a proper citizen reserve. 
I am not forgetting our National Guard. I have had the 
privilege of being governor of one of our great States, and 
there I was brought into association with what I am glad to 
believe is one of the most efficient portions of the National 
Guard of the Nation. I learned to admire the men, to respect 
the officers, and to believe in the National Guard; and I 
believe that it is the duty of Congress to do very much more 
for the National Guard than it has ever done heretofore. I 
believe that that great arm of our national defense should 
be built up and encouraged to the utmost; but, you know, 
gentlemen, that under the Constitution of the United States 
the National Guard is under the direction of more than two- 
score States; that it is not permitted to the National Govern- 
ment directly to have a voice in its development and 
organization: and that onl}^ upon occasion of actual invasion 
has the President of the United States the right to ask those 
men to leave their respective States. I, for my part, am 
afraid, though some gentlemen differ with me, that there is 
no way in which that force can be made a direct resource as 
a national reser\^e under national authority. 

Wha.t we need is a body of men trained in association with 
units of the Army, a body of men organized under the im- 
mediate direction of the national authority, a body of men 



104 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

subject to the immediate call to arms of the national author- 
ity, and yet men not put into the ranks of the Regular Army; 
men left to their tasks of civil life, men supplied with equip- 
ment and training, but not drawn away from the peaceful 
pursuits w^hich have made America great and must keep her 
great. I am not a partisan of any one plan. I have had too 
much experience to think that it is right to say that the plan 
that I propose is the only plan that will work, because I 
have a shrewd sirspicion that there may be other plans that 
will work. WTiat I am after, and what every American ought 
to insist upon, is a body of at least half a million trained 
citizens who will serve under co^iditions of danger as an im- 
mediately availa'ble national reserve. 

I am not saying anything about the Navy to-night, be- 
cause for some reason there is not the same controversy 
about tlie Navy that there is about the Army. The Navy 
is obvious and easily understood; the Army apparently is 
very difficult to comprehend and understand. We have a 
traditional prejudice against armies which makes us stop 
thinking calmly the minute we begin talking about them. 
We suppose that all armies are alike and that there can not 
be an American Army system, that it must be a European 
system, and that is what I for one am trying to divest my 
own mind of. The Navy is so obvious an instrument of 
national defense that I believe that, with differences of opin- 
ion about the detail, it is not going to be difficult to carry 
out a proper and reasonable program for the increase of the 
Nav}^ 

But that is another story; my theme to-night is national 
defense on land where we seem most negligent of it. And I 
do not want to leave in your minds the impression that I 
have any anxiety as to the outcome, for I have not the 
slightest. There is only one wa}^ for parties and individuals 
to win the confidence of this Nation and that is by doing 
the things that ought to be done. Nobody is going to be 
deceived. Speeches are not going to wnn elections. The 
facts are going to speak for themselves and speak louder 
than anybody who controverts them. No political party, 
no group of men, can afford to disappoint America. This 
is a year of political accounting, and the Americans in poli- 



Jan. 2 7] NEED OF AN ARMY AND NAVY 105 

tics are rather expert accountants. They know what the 
books contain and they are not going to be deceived about 
them. No man is going to hide behind any excuse; the goods 
must be dehvered or the confidence will not be enjoyed. For 
my part, I hope that every man in public life will get what is 
coming to him. 

If this is true, gentlemen, it is because of things that lie 
much deeper than laughter, much deeper than cheers; lie 
down at the very roots of our life. America refuses to be 
deceived about the things that most concern her national 
honor and national safety, that lie at the foundation of every- 
thing that you love. It is the solemn time when men must 
examine not only their purposes but their hearts. Men must 
purge themselves of individual ambition, and must see to it 
that they are ready for the utmost self-sacrifice in the inter- 
ests of the common welfare. Let no man dare play the 
marplot. Let no man dare bring partisan passion into these 
great things. Let men honestly debate the facts and coura- 
geously act upon them. Then there will come that day when 
the world will say, "This America that we thought was full 
of a multitude of contrary counsels now speaks with the great 
volume of the heart's accord, and that great heart of America 
has behind it the supreme moral force of righteousness and 
hope and the liberty of mankind." 

White House Pamphlet. 

32. HOW TO AVOID WAR 

(February 24, 19 16) 

Letter to Senator Stone 

I very warmly appreciate your kind and frank letter of 
to-day, and feel that it calls for an equally frank reply. 

You are right in assuming that I shall do everything in 
my power to keep the United States out of war. I think 
the country will feel no uneasiness about my course in that 
respect. Through many anxious months I have striven for 
that object, amid difficulties more manifold than can have 
been apparent upon the surface, and so far I have succeeded. 
I do not doubt that I shall continue to succeed. The course 



io6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

-which the central European powers have announced their 
intention of follovving in the future with regard to undersea 
warfare seems for the moment to threaten insuperable 
obstacles, but its apparent meaning is so manifestly incon- 
sistent with explicit assurances recently given us by those 
powers with regard to their treatment of merchant vessels 
on the high seas that I must believe that explanations will 
presently ensue which will put a different aspect upon it. 
We have had no reason to question their good faith or their 
fidelity to their promises in the past, and I for one feel con- 
fident that we shall have none in the future. 

But in any event our duty is clear. No nation, no group 
of nations, has the right, while war is in progress, to alter 
or disregard the principles which all nations have agreed upon 
in mitigation of the horrors and sufferings of war; and if the 
clear rights of American citizens should very unhappily be 
1 abridged or denied by any such action, we should, it seems 
to me, have in honor no choice as to what our own course 
should be. 

For my own part, I cannot consent to any abridgment 
of the rights of American citizens in any respect. The honor 
and self-respect of the Nation is involved. We covet peace, 
and shall preserve it at any cost but the loss of honor. To 
forbid our people to exercise their rights for fear we might 
be called upon to vindicate them would be a deep humilia- 
tion indeed. It would be an implicit, all but an explicit, 
acquiescence in the violation of the rights of mankind every- 
where and of \\'hatever nation or allegiance. It would be a 
deliberate abdication of our hitherto proud position as 
spokesmen, even amid the turmoil of war, for the law and 
the right. It would make everything this Government has 
attempted and everything that it has accomplished during 
this terrible struggle of nations meaningless and futile. 

It is important to reflect that if in this instance we allowed 
expediency to take the place of principle the door would 
inevitably be opened to still further concessions. Once ac- 
cept a single abatement of right, and many other humilia- 
tions would certainly follow, and the whole fine fabric of 
international law might crumble under our hands piece by 
piece. What we are contending for in this matter is of the 



Feb. 24] HOW TO AVOID WAR 107 

very essence of the things that have made America a sovereign 
nation. She cannot yield them without conceding her own 
impotency as a Nation and making virtual surrender of her 
independent position among the nations of the world. 

I am speaking, my dear Senator, in deep solemnity, with- 
out heat, with a clear consciousness of the high responsi- 
bilities of my office and as your sincere and devoted friend. 
If we should unhappily differ, we shall differ as friends, 
but where issues so momentous as these are involved we 
must, just because we are friends, speak our minds without 
reservation. 

Congressional Record, LIII, 3318. 

ro- BASIS OF AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY 

(February 26, 1916) 

Address to the Gridiron Club at Washington 

* -:< ^ It is not a new feeling on my part, but one which 
I entertain with a greater intensity than formerly that a 
man who seeks the Presidency of the United States for any- 
thing that it will bring to him is an audacious fool. The 
responsibilities of the office ought to sober a man even before 
he approaches it. One of the difficulties of the office seldom 
appreciated, I dare say, is that it is very difficult to think 
while so many people are talking in a way that obscures 
counsel and is entirely off the point. 

The point in national affairs, gentlemen, never lies along 
the lines of expediency. It always rests in the field of prin- 
ciple. The United States was not founded upon any prin- 
ciple of expediency; it was founded upon a profound prin- 
ciple of human liberty and of humanity, and whenever it 
bases its policy upon any other foundations than those it 
builds on the sand and not upon the solid rock. * * * It 
seems to me that if you do not think of the things that lie 
beyond and away from and disconnected from this scene in 
which we attempt to think and conclude, you will mevitably 
be led astray. I would a great deal rather know what they 
are talking about around quiet firesides all over the country 
than what they are talking about in the cloakrooms of Con- 



io8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

gress. I would a great deal rather know what the men on 
the trains and by the wayside and in the shops and on the 
farms are thinking about and yearning for than hear any 
of the vociferous proclamations of policy which it is so easy 
to hear and so easy to read by picking up any scrap of 
printed paper. There is only one way to hear these things, 
and that is constantly to go back to the fountains of American 
action. Those fountains are not to be found in any recently 
discovered sources. * * * 

America ought to keep out of this war. She ought to 
keep out of this war at the sacrifice of everything except 
this, single thing upon which her character and history are 
founded, her sense of humanity and justice. If she sacri- 
fices that, she has ceased to be America; she has ceased 
to entertain and to love the traditions which have made us 
proud to be Americans; and when we go about seeking 
safety at the expense of humanity, then I, for one, will be- 
lieve that I have always been mistaken in what I have con- 
ceived to be the spirit of American history. 

You never can tell your direction except by long measure- 
ments. You can not establish a line by two posts; you have 
got to have three at least to know whether they are straight 
with anything, and the longer your line the more certain 
your measurement. There is only one way in vrhich to 
determine how the future of the United States is going to 
be projected, and that is by looking back and seeing which 
way the lines ran which led up to the present moment of 
power and of opportunity. There is no doubt about that. 
There is no question what the roll of honor in America is. 
The roll of honor consists of the names of men who have 
squared their conduct by ideals of duty. There is no one 
else upon the roster; there is no one else whose name we 
care to remember when we measure things upon a national 
scale. And I wish that whenever an impulse of impatience 
comes upon us, whenever an impulse to settle a thing some 
short way tempts us, we might close the door and take down 
some old stories of what American idealists and statesmen 
did in the past, and not let any counsel in that does not 
sound in the authentic voice of American tradition. Then 
we shall be certain what the lines of the future are, because 



Feb. 26] BASIS OF AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY 109 

we shall know we are steering by the lines of the past. We 
shall know that no temporary convenience, no temporary 
expediency will lead us either to be rash or to be cowardly. 
I would be just as much ashamed to be rash as I would to 
be a coward. Valor is self-respecting. Valor is circumspect. 
Valor strikes only when it is the right to strike. Valor with- J 
i holds itself from all small implications and entanglements 
and waits for the great opportunity when the sword will 
flash as if it carried the light of heaven upon its blade. 

Congressional Record, LIII, 3308. 

34. RIGHT OF AMERICANS TO TRAVERSE 
THE SEAS 

(February 29, 1916) 

Letter to Representative Pou on the McLemore 
Resolution 

Inasmuch as I learn that Mr. Henry, the chairman of 
the Committee on Rules, is absent -in Texas, I take the liberty 
of calling your attention, as ranking member of the com- 
mittee, to a matter of grave concern to the country which 
can, I believe, be handled, under the rules of the House, only 
by that committee. 

The report that there are divided counsels in Congress 
in regard to the foreign policy of the Government is being 
made industrious use of in foreign capitals. I believe that 
report to be false, but so long as it is anywhere credited it 
can not fail to do the greatest harm and expose the country 
to the most serious risks. I therefore feel justified in asking 
that your committee will permit me to urge an early vote 
upon the resolutions with regard to travel on armed mer- 
chantmen which have recently been so much talked about, in 
order that there may be afforded an immediate opportunity; 
for full public discussion and action upon them and that all 
doubts and conjectures may be swept away and our foreign 
relations once more cleared of damaging misunderstandings. 

The matter is of so grave importance and lies so clearly 
within the field of Executive initiative that I venture to hope 
that your committee will not think that I am taking an un- 



no ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

warranted liberty in making this suggestion as to the business 
of the House; and I very earnestly commend it to their 
immediate consideration. 

Congressional Record, LIII, App. 681. 

35. EXPEDITION INTO MEXICO 

(March 25, 19 16) 

Statement to the Press 

As has already been announced, the expedition into 
Mexico was ordered imder an agreement with the de facto 
Government of Mexico for the single purpose of taking the 
bandit Villa, whose forces had actually invaded the territory 
of the United States, and is in no sense intended as an 
invasion of that republic or as an infringement of its 
sovereignty. 

I have, therefore, asked the several news services to be 
good enough to assist the Administration in keeping this 
view of the expedition constantly before both the people of 
this country and the distressed and sensitive people of 
Mexico, who are very susceptible, indeed, to impressions 
received from the American press not only, but also very 
ready to believe that those impressions proceed from the 
views and objects of our Govemm.ent itself. Such con- 
clusions, it must be said, are not unnatural, because the 
main, if not the only, source of information for the people 
on both sides of the border is the public press of the United 
States. 

In order to avoid the creation of erroneous and danger- 
ous impressions in this way I have called upon the several 
news agencies to use the utmost care not to give news stories 
regarding this expedition the color of war, to withhold 
stories of troop movements and military preparations which 
might be given that interpretation, and to refrain from 
publishing unverified rumors of unrest in Mexico. 

I feel that it is most desirable to impress upon both our 
own people and the people of Mexico the fact that the 
expedition is simply a necessar>^ punitive measure, aimed 
solely at the elimination of the maurauders who raided 



ir. 2 5 ] EXPEDITION INTO MEXICO 1 1 1 

Dolumbus and who infest an unprotected district near the 
)order, which they use as a base in making attacks upon the 
ives and property of our citizens within our own territory, 
[t is the purpose of our commanders to coooerate in every 
possible way with the forces of General Carranza in re- 
moving this cause of irritation to both Governments, and 
retire from Mexican territory so soon as that object is ac- 
:omplished. 

It is my duty to warn the people of the United States 
that there are persons all along the border who are actively 
aigaged in originating and giving as wide currency as they 
:an to rumors of the most sensational and disturbing sort, 
which are wholly unjustified by the facts. The object of 
this traffic in falsehood is obvious. It is to create intolerable 
friction between the Government of the United States and 
the de facto Government of Mexico for the purpose of 
Dimging about intervention in the interest of certain Ameri- 
can owners of Mexican properties. This object can not be 
attained so long as sane and honorable men are in control 
of this Government, but very serious conditions may be 
created, unnecessary bloodshed may result, and the relations 
between the two republics may be very much embarrassed. 

The people of the United States should know the sinister 
and unscrupulous influences that are afoot, and should be 
on their guard against crediting any story coming from the 
border; and those who disseminate the news should make it 
a matter of patriotism and of conscience to test the source 
and authenticity of every report they receive from that 
quarter. New York Times, March 26, 19 16. 

36. ULTIMATUM ON SUBMARINE WARFARE 

(April 19, 1916) 

Address to Congress 

A situation has arisen in the foreign relations of the country 
of which it is my plain duty to inform you very frank] v. 

It will be recalled that in February, 1915, the Imperial 
German Government announced its intention to treat the 
waters surrounding Great Britain and Ireland as embraced 
within the seat of war and to destroy all merchant ships 



112 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

owned by its enemies that might be found within any part 
of that portion of the high seas, and that it warned all 
vessels, of neutral as well as of belligerent ownership, to 
keep out of the waters it had thus proscribed or else enter 
them at their peril. The Government of the United States 
earnestly pretested. It took the position that such a policy 
could not be pursued without the practical certainty of gross 
and palpable violations of the law of nations, particularly if 
submarine craft were to be employed as its instruments, 
inasmuch as the rules prescribed by that law, rules founded 
upon principles of humanity and established for the pro- 
tection of the lives of non-combatants at sea, could not in 
the nature of the case be observed by such vessels. It based 
its protest on the ground that persons of neutral nationality 
and vessels of neutral ownership would be exposed to extreme 
and intolerable risks, and that no right to close any part of 
the high seas against their use or to expose them to such 
risks could lawfully be asserted by any belligerent govern- 
ment. The law of nations in these matters, upon which the 
Government of the United States based its protest, is not 
of recent origin or founded upon merely arbitrary principles 
set up by convention. It is based, on the contrary, upon 
manifest and imperative principles of humanity and has long 
been established vath the approval and by the express assent 
of all civilized nations. 

Notwithstanding the earnest protest of our Government, 
the Imperial German Government at once proceeded to carry 
out the policy it had announced. It expressed the hope that 
the dangers involved, at any rate the dangers to neutral 
vessels, would be reduced to a minimum by the instructions 
v.hich it had issued to its subm.arine commanders, and assured 
the Government of the United States that it would take 
every possible precaution both to respect the rights of neutrals 
and to safeguard the lives of non-combatants. 

What has actually happened in the year which has since 
elapsed has shown that those hopes were not justified, those 
assurances insusceptible of being lulhlled. In pursuance of 
the policy of submarine warfare against the commerce of its 
adversaries, thus announced and entered upon by the Im- 
perial German Government m despite of the solemn protest 



Apr. 19] ULTIMATUM ON SUBMARINE 113 

of this Government, the commanders of German undersea 
vessels have attacked merchant ships with greater and greater 
activity, not only upon the high seas surrounding Great 
Britain and Ireland but wherever they could encounter them, 
in a way that has grown more and more ruthless, more and 
more indiscriminate as the months have gone b}^, less and 
less observant of restraints of any kind and have delivered 
their attacks without compunction against vessels of every 
nationality and bound upon every sort of errand. Vessels 
of neutral ownership, even vessels of neutral ownership bound 
from neutral port to neutral port, have been destroyed along 
with vessels of belligerent ownership in constantly increasing 
numbers. Sometimes the merchantmen attacked has been 
warned and summoned to surrende" before being fired on or 
i torpedoed; sometimes passengers or crews have been vouch- 
safed the poor security of being allowed to take to the ship's 
boats before she was sent to the bottom. But again and 
again no warning has been given, no escape even to the ship's 
boats allowed to those on board. What this Government 
foresaw must happen has happened. Tragedy has followed 
tragedy on the seas in such fashion, with such attendant 
circumstances, as to make it grossly evident that warfare 
of such a sort, if warfare it be, cannot be carried on without 
the most palpable violation of the dictates alike of right and 
of humanity. Whatever the disposition and intention of the 
Imperial German Government, it has manifestly proved im- 
possible for it to keep such methods of attack upon the 
commerce of its enemies within the bounds set by either 
reason or the heart of mankind. 

In February of the present year the Imperial German 
Government informed this Government and the other neutral 
governments of the world that it had reason to believe that 
the Government of Great Britain had armed all merchant 
vessels of British ownership and had given them secret orders 
to attack any submarine of the enemy they might encounter 
upon the seas, and that the Imperial German Government 
felt justified in the circumstances in treating all armed mer- 
chantmen of belligerent ownership as auxiliary vessels of 
war, which it would have the right to destroy without warn- 
ing. The law of nations has long recognized the right of 



114 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

merchantmen to carry arms for protection and to use them 
to repel attack, though to use them, in such circumstances, 
at their own risk; but the Imperial German Government 
claimed the right to set these understandings aside in circum- 
stances which it deemed extraordinary. Even the terms in 
which it announced its purpose thus still further to relax 
the restraints it had previously professed its willingness and 
desire to put upon the operations of its submarines carried 
the plain implication that at least vessels which v/ere not , 
armed would still be exempt from destruction without warn- 
ing and that personal safety v/ould be accorded their pas- 
sengers and crews; but even that limitation, if it was ever 
practicable to observe it, has in fact constituted no check at 
all upon the destruction of ships of every sort. 

Again and again the Imperial German Government has 
given this Government its solemn assurances that at least 
passenger ships would not be thus dealt v/ith, and yet it has 
again and again permitted its undersea commanders to dis- 
regard those assurances with entire im.punity. Great liners 
like the Lusttania and the Arabic and mere ferryboats like 
the Sussex have been attacked without a moment's warning, 
sometim.es before they had even become aware that they were 
in the presence of an armed vessel of the enemy, and the lives 
of non-combatnats, passengers and crew, have been sacrificed 
wholesale, in a manner which the Government of the United 
States can not but regard as wanton and without the slight- 
est color of justification. No limit of any kind has in fact 
been set to the indiscriminate pursuit and destruction of 
merchantmen of all kinds and nationalities within the 
waters, constantly extending in area, where these operations 
have been carried on; and the roll of Americans who have 
lost their lives on ships thus attacked and destroyed has 
groAvn month by month until the ominous toll has mounted 
into the hundreds. 

One of the latest and most shocking instances of this 
method of warfare was that of the destruction of the French 
cross-Channel steamer Sussex. It must stand forth, as the 
sinldng of the steamer Lusitania did, as so singularly tragical 
and unjustifiable as to constitute a truly terrible example of 
the inhumanity of submarine warfare as the comm.anders of 



Apr. 19 ] ULTIMATUM ON SUBMARINE iiS 

German vessels have for the past twelvemonth been conduct- 
ing it. If this instance stood alone, some explanation, some 
disavowal by the German Government, some evidence of 
criminal mistake or wilful disobedience on the part of the 
commander of the vessel that fired the torpedo might be 
sought or entertained ; but unhappily it does not stand alone. 
Recent events make the conclusion inevitable that it is only 
one instance, even though it be one of the most extreme and 
distressing instances, of the spirit and method of warfare 
which the Imperial German Government has mistakenly 
adopted, and v/hich from the first exposed that Government 
to the reproach of thrusting all neutral rights aside in pursuit 
of its immediate objects. 

The Government of the United States has been very pa- 
tient. At every stage of this distressing experience of tragedy 
after tragedy in which its own citizens were involved it has 
sought to be restrained from any extreme course of action 
or of protest by a thoughtful consideration of the extraordi- 
nary circumstances of this unprecedented war, and actuated 
in all that it said or did by the sentiments of genuine friend- 
ship w^hich the people of the United States have always 
entertained and continue to entertain tow^ards the German 
nation. It has of course accepted the successive explana- 
tions and assurances of the Imperial German Government as 
given in entire sincerity and good faith, and has hoped, even 
against hope, that it would prove to be possible for the Ger- 
man Government so to order and control the acts of its naval 
commanders as to square its policy with the principles of hu- 
manity as embodied in the law^ of nations. It has been willing 
to wait until the significance of the facts became absolutely 
unmistakable and susceptible of but one interpretation. 

That point has now unhappily been reached. The facts 
are susceptible of but one interpretation. The Imperial 
German Government has been unable to put any limits or 
restraints upon its warfare against either freight or passenger 
ships. It has therefore become painfully evident that the 
f)osition which this Government took at the very outset is 
inevitable, namely, that the use of submarines for the de- 
struction of an enemy's commerce is of necessity, because of 
the very character of the vessels employed and the very 



ii6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

j methods of attack which their employment of course in- 
1 volves, incompatible with the principles of humanity, the 
long established and incontrovertible rights of neutrals, and| 
. the sacred immunities of non-combatants. 

I have deemed it my duty, therefore, to say to the Imperial 
German Government that if it is still its purpose to prose- 
cute relentless and indiscriminate warfare against vessels of 
commerce by the use of submarines, notv;ithstanding the now 
demonstrated impossibility of conducting that warfare in 
accordance with what the Government of the United States ' 
must consider the sacred and indisputable rules of interna- 
tional law and the universally recognized dictates of human- 
ity, the Government of the United States is at last forced 
to the conclusion that there is but one course it can pursue; 
and that unless the Imperial German Government should 
now immediately declare and effect an abandonment of its 
present methods of v;arfare against passenger and freight 
carrying vessels this Government can have no choice but to 

L sever diplomatic relations w^ith the Government of the Ger- 
man Empire altogether. 

This decision I have arrived at with the keenest regret; 
the possibility of the action contemplated I am sure all 
thoughtful Americans will look forward to with unaffected 
reluctance. But we cannot forget that v;e are in some sort 
and by the force of circumstances the responsible spokesmen 
of the rights of humanity, and that we cannot remain silent 
while those rights seem in process of being swept utterly 
away in the maelstrom of this terrible war. We owe it to a 
due regard for our own rights as a nation, to our sense of 
duty as a representative of the rights of neutrals the world 
over, and to a just conception of the rights of mankind to 
take this stand now with the utmost solemnity and firmness. 

I have taken it, and taken it in the confidence that it will 
meet with your approval and support. All sober-minded 
men must unite in hoping that the Imperial German Govern- 
ment, which has in other circumstances stood as the champion 
of all that we are now contending for in the intere9t of 
humanity, may recognize the justice of our demands and 
meet them in the spirit in which they are made. 

Wliite House Pamphlet. 



Mays] QUALIFICATIONS OF A JUSTICE 117 

37. QUALIFICATIONS OF A SUPREME COURT 
JUSTICE 

(May 5, 1916) 

Letter to Senator Culberson on Mr. Brandeis 

I am very much obliged to you for giving me an oppor- 
tunity to make clear to the Judiciary Committee my reasons 
for nominating. Mr. Louis D. Brandeis to fill the vacancy in 
the Supreme Court of the United States created by the death 
of Mr. Justice Lamar, for I am profoundly interested in the 
confirmation of the appointment by the Senate. 

There is probably no more important duty imposed upon 
the President in connection with the general administration 
of the Government than that of naming members of the 
Supreme Court; and I need hardly tell j^ou that I named 
Mr. Brandeis as a member of that great tribunal only be- 
cause I knew him to be singularly qualified by learning, by 
gifts, and by character for the position. 

Many charges have been made against Mr. Brandeis; the 
report of your subcommittee has already made it plain to 
you and to the country at large how unfounded those charges 
were. They threw a great deal more light upon the character 
and motives of those with whom they originated than upon 
the qualifications of Mr. Brandeis. I myself looked into 
them three years ago when I desired to make Mr. Brandeis 
a member of my Cabinet and found that they proceeded 
for the most part from those who hated Mr. Brandeis 
because he had refused to be serviceable to them in the 
promotion of their own selfish interests, and from those whom 
they had prejudiced and misled. The propaganda in this 
matter has been very extraordinary and very distressing to 
those who love fairness and value the dignity of the great 
professions. 

I perceived from the first that the charges were intrin- 
sically incredible by anyone who had really known Mr. 
Brandeis. I have known him. I have tested him by seeking 
his advice upon some of the most difficult and p)erplexing 
public questions about which it was necessary for me to form 



ii8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

a judgrrient. I have dealt with him in matters where nice 
questions of honor and fair play, as well as large questions 
of justice and the public benefit, were involved. In every 
matter in which I have made test of his judgment and 
point of view I have received from him counsel singularly 
enlightening, singularly clear-sighted and judicial, and, above 
all, full of moral stimulation. He is a friend of all just men 
and a lover of right; and he knows more than how to talk 
about the right — he knows how to set it forward in the face 
of its enemies. I knew from direct personal knowledge of 
the man what I was doing v/hen I named him for the highest 
and most responsible tribunal of the Nation. 

Of his extraordinary ability as a lawyer no man who is ] 
competent to judge can speak ;vith anything but the highest j 
admiration. You will remember that in the opinion of the j 
late Chief Justice Fuller he was the ablest man who ever j 
appeared before the Supreme Court of the United States. ] 
"He is also," the Chief Justice added, "absolutely fearless j 
in the discharge of his duties." ] 

Those who have resorted to him for assistance in settling [ 
great industrial disputes can testify to his fairness and love : 
of justice. In the troublesome controversies between the i 
garment workers and manufacturers of New York City, for \ 
example, he gave a truly remarkable proof of his judicial ] 
temperament and had what must have been the great satis- j 
faction of rendering decisions which both sides were willfng 5 
to accept as disinterested and even-handed. \ 

Mr. Brandeis has rendered many notable services to the '-. 
city and state with which his professional life has been j 
identified. He successfully directed the difficult campaign :* 
which resulted in obtaining cheaper gas for the city of Boston. 1 
It was chiefly under his guidance and through his efforts 1 
that legislation was secured in Massachusetts which author- 
ized savings banks to issue insurance policies for small sums i 
at much reduced rates. And some gentlemen who tried very ; 
hard to obtain control by the Boston Elevated Railroad - 
Company of the subways of the city for a period of ninety- j 
nine years can probably testify as to his ability as the peo- : 
pie's advocate when public interests call for an effective -^ 



Mays] QUALIFICATIONS OF A JUSTICE 119 

champion. He rendered these services without compensation, 
and earned, whether he got it or not, the gratitude of every 
citizen of the state and city he served. These are but a few 
of the services of this kind he has freely rendered. It will 
hearten friends of community and public rights throughout 
the country to see his quality signally recognized by his 
elevation to the Supreme Bench; for the whole country is 
aware of his quality and is interested in this appointment. 

I did 'not in making choice of Mr. Brandeis ask for or 
depend upon ''endorsements." I acted upon public knowl- 
edge and personal acquaintance with the man, and preferred 
to name a lawyer for this great office whose abilities and 
character were so widely recognized that he needed no en- 
dorsement. I did, however, personally consult many men in 
whose judgment I had great confidence, and am happy to 
say was supported in my selection by the voluntary recom- 
mendation of the Attorney General of the United States, who 
urged Mr. Brandeis upon my consideration independently 
of any suggestion from me. 

Let me say by way of summing up, my dear Senator, that 
I nominated Mr. Brandeis for the Supreme Court because it 
v/as, and is, my deliberate judgment that, of all the men 
now at the bar whom it has been my privilege to observe, 
test, and know, he is exceptionally qualified. I cannot speak 
too highl}^ of his impartial, impersonal, orderly, and con- 
structive mind, his rare analytical powers, his deep human 
sympathy, his profound acquaintance with the historical roots 
of our institutions and insight into their spirit, or of the 
many evidences he has given of being imbued to the very 
heart with our American ideals of justice and equality of 
opportunity; of his knowledge of modern economic condi- 
tions and of the way they bear upon the masses of the people, 
or of his genius in getting persons to unite in common and 
harmonious action and look with frank and kindly eyes into 
each other's minds, who had before been heated antagonists. 
This friend of justice and of men will ornament the high 
court of which we are all so justly proud. I am glad to have 
had the opportunity to pay him this tribute of admiration 
and of confidence; and I beg that your committee will accept 



120 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

this nomination as coming from me quick with a sense of 
public obligation and responsibility. 

Congressional Record, LIII, 7628. 



38. GERMAN ABANDONMENT OF THE SUB- 
MARINE POLICY 

(May 8, 1916) 

Despatch to the German Government through 
Secretary Lansing 

The note of the Imperial German Government under date 
of May 4, 19 1 6, has received careful consideration by the 
Government of the United States. It is especially noted, as 
indicating the purpose of the Imperial Government as to the 
future, that it "is prepared to do its utmost to confine the 
operations of the war for the rest of its duration to the. 
fighting forces of the belligerents," and that it is determined 
to impose upon all its commanders at sea the limitations of 
the recognized rules of international law upon which the 
Government of the United States has insisted. Throughout 
the months which have elapsed since the Imperial Govern- 
ment announced, on February 4, 191 5, its submarine policy, 
now happily abandoned, the Government of the United 
States has been constantly guided and restrained by motives 
of friendship in its patient efforts to bring to an amicable 
settlement the critical questions arising from that policy. 
Accepting the Imperial Government's declaration of its aban- 
donment of the policy which has so seriously menaced the 
good relations between the two countries, the Government of 
the United States v>^ill rely upon a scrupulous execution 
henceforth of the now^ altered policy of the Imperial Govern- 
ment, such as will remove the principal danger to an inter- 
ruption of the good relations existing between the Ignited 
States and Germany. 

The Government of the United States feels it necessary 
to state that it takes it for granted that the Imperial Ger- 
man Government does not intend to imply that the main- 



May 8] SUBMARINE POLICY 121 

tenance of its newly announced policy is in any way con- 
tingent upon the course or result of diplomatic negotiations 
between the Government of the United States and any other 
belligerent Government, notwithstanding the fact that cer- 
tain passages in the Imperial Government's note of the 4th 
instant might appear to be susceptible of that construction. 
In order, however, to avoid any possible misunderstanding, 
the Government of the United States notifies the Imperial 
Government that it cannot for a moment entertain, much less 
discuss, a suggestion that respect by German naval authori- 
ties for the rights of citizens of the United States upon the 
high seas should in any way or in the slightest degree be 
made contingent upon the conduct of any other Government 
affecting the rights of neutrals and non-combatants. Re- 
sponsibility in such matters is single, not joint; absolute, not 
relative. 

Department of State, White Book, No. Ill, 306. 



39. HOW TO ENFORCE PEACE 

(May 27, 1916) 

Address to the League to Enforce Peace at 
Washington 

WTien the invitation to be here to-night came to me, I was 
glad to accept it, — not because it offered me an opportunity 
to discuss the programme of the League, — that you will, I 
am sure, not expect of me, — but because the desire of the 
whole world now turns eagerly, more and more eagerly, 
tovs^ards the hope of peace, and there is just rea^^on why we 
should take our part in counsel upon this great theme. It is 
right that I, as spokesmen of our Government, should attempt 
to give expression to what I believe to be the thought and 
purpose of the people of the L^nited States in this vital 
matter. 

This great war that broke so suddenly upon the world two 
years ago, and which has swept within its flame so great a 
part of the civilized world, has affected us very profoundly, 



122 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

and we are not only at liberty, it is perhaps our duty, to 
speak very frankly of it and of the great interests of civiliza- 
tion which it affects. 
/ With its causes and its objects we are not concerned. The 
" obscure fountains from which its stupendous flood has burst 
forth we are not interested to search for or explore. But 
so great a flood, spread far and wide to every quarter of 
the globe, has of necessity engulfed many a fair province 
of right that lies very near to us. Our own rights as a 
Nation, the liberties, the privileges, and the property of our 
people have been profoundly affected. We are not mere 
disconnected lookers-on. The longer the war lasts, the more 
deeply do w^e become concerned that it should be brought to 
an end and the world be permitted to resume its normal life 
and course again. And w^hen it does come to an end we shall 
be as much concerned as the nations at w^ar to see peace 
assume an aspect of permanence, give promise of days from 
which the anxiety of uncertainty shall be lifted, bring some 
assurance that peace and war shall always hereafter be reck- 
oned part of the common interest of mankind. We are par- 
ticipants, whether w^e would or not, in the life of the world. 
The interests of all nations are our o\mi also. We are part- 
ners with the rest. What affects mankind is inevitably our 
affair as well as the affair of the nations of Europe and of 
Asia. 

One observation on the causes of the present war we are 
at liberty to make, and to make it may throw some light 
forward upon the future, as well as backward upon the past. 
It is plain that this war could have come only as it did, 
suddenly and out of secret counsels, without warning to the 
world, v/ithout discussion, without any of the deliberate 
movements of counsel with which it would seem natural 
to approach so stupendous a contest. It is probable that 
if it had been foreseen just what would happen, just what 
alliances would be formed, just what forces arrayed against 
one another, those who brought the great contest on would 
have been glad to substitute conference for force. If we 
ourselves had been afforded some opportunity to apprise 
the belligerents of the attitude which it would be our duty 
to take, of the policies and practices against which we would 



May 27] HOW TO ENFORCE PEACE 123 

feel bound to use all our moral and economic strength, and 
in certain circumstances even our physical strength also, 
our own contribution to the counsel which might have 
averted the struggle would have been considered v/orth 
weighing and regarding. 

And the lesson which the shock of being taken by sur- 
prise in a matter so deeply vital to all the nations of the 
world has made poignantly clear is, that the peace of the 
world must henceforth depend upon a new and more whole- 
some diplomacy. Only when the great nations of the world 
have reached some sort of agreement as to what they hold 
to be fundamental to their common interest, and as to some 
feasible method of acting in concert when any nation or group 
of nations seeks to disturb those fundamental things, can we 
feel that civilization is at last in a way of justifying its 
existence and claiming to be finally established. It is clear 
that nations must in the future be governed by the same 
high code of honor that we demand of individuals. 

We must, indeed, in the very same breath with which we 
avow this conviction admit that we have ourselves upon 
occasion in the past been offenders against the law of diplo- 
macy which we thus forecast; but our conviction is not the 
less clear, but rather the more clear, on that account. If 
this war has accomplished nothing else for the benefit of the 
world, it has at least disclosed a great moral necessity and 
set forward the thinking of the statesmen of the world by a 
whole age. Repeated utterances of the leading statesmen 
of most of the great nations now engaged in war have made 
it plain that their thought has come to this, that the prin- 
ciple of public right must henceforth take precedence over 
the individual interests of particular nations, and that the 
nations of the world must in some way band themselves to- 
gether to see that that right prevails as against any sort of 
selfish aggression; that henceforth alliance must not be set 
up against alliance, understanding against understanding, but 
that there must be a common agreement for a common 
object, and that at the heart of that common object must lie 
the inviolable rights of peoples and of mankind. The nations 
of the world have become each other's neighbors. It is to 
their interest that they should understand each other. In 



124 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

order that they may understand each other, it is imperative 
that they should agree to cooperate in a common cause, and 
that they should so act that the guiding principle of that 
common cause shall be even-handed and impartial justice. 

This is undoubtedly the thought of America. This is what 
we ourselves will say when there comes proper occasion to 
say it. In the dealings of nations with one another arbitrary 
force must be rejected and we must move forward to the 
thought of the modern world, the thought of which peace 
is the very atmosphere. That thought constitutes a chief 
part of the passionate conviction of America. 

We believe these fundamental things: First, that every 
people has a right to choose the sovereignty under which 
they shall live. Like other nations, we have ourselves no 
doubt once and again offended against that principle when 
for a little while controlled by selfish passion, as our franker 
historians Lave been honorable enough to admit; but it has 
become more and more our rule of life and action. Second, 
that the small states of the world have a right to enjoy the 
same respect for their sovereignty and for their territorial 
integrity that great and powerful nations expect and insist 
upon. And, third, that the world has a right to be free 
from every disturbance of its peace that has its origin in 
aggression and disregard of the rights of peoples and 
nations. 

So sincerely do we believe in these things that I am sure 
that I speak the mind and wish of the people of America 
when I say that the United States is willing to become a 
partner in any feasible association of nations formed in order 
to realize these objects and make them secure against vio- 
lation. 

There is nothing that the United States wants for itself 
that any other nation has. We are willing, on the contrary, 
to limit ourselves along with them to a prescribed course of 
duty and respect for the rights of others which will check 
any selfish passion of our own, as it will check any aggressive 
impulse of theirs. 

If it should ever be our privilege to suggest or initiate a 
movement for peace among the nations now at war, I am 
sure that the people of the United States would wish their 



May 2 7] HOW TO ENFORCE PEACE 125 

Government to move along these lines: First, such a settle- 
ment with regard to their own immediate interests as the 
belligerents may agree upon. We have nothing material of 
any kin(i to ask for ourselves, and are quite aware that we 
are in no sense or degree parties to the present quarrel. 
Our interest is only in^ peace and its future guarantees. 
Second, an universal association of the nations to maintain 
the inviolate security of the highway of the seas for the 
common and unhindered use of all the nations of the world, 
and to prevent any war begun either contrary to treaty 
covenants or without warning and full submission of the 
causes to the opinion of the w^orld, — a virtual guarantee of 
territorial integrity and political independence. ~~ 

But T did not come here, let me repeat, to discuss a 
programme. I came only to avow^ a creed and give expres- 
sion to the confidence I feel that the v»^orld is even now 
upon the ove of a great consummation, when some common 
force will be brought into existence w^hich shall safeguard 
right as tlie first and most fundamental interest of all peoples 
and all governments, when coercion shall be summoned not 
to the service of political ambition or selfish hostility, but 
to the service of a common order, a common justice, and a 
common peace. God grant that the dawn of that day of 
franli dealing and of settled peace, concord, and cooperation 
may be near at hand! 

White House Pamphlet. 



40. PREPAREDNESS TO THE SOLDIER 

(June 13, 1916) 

Address at the Military Academy, West Point 

I look upon this body of men who are graduating to-day 
with a peculiar interest. I feel like congratulating them 
that they are living in a day not only so interesting, because 
so fraught with change, but also because so responsible. 
Days of responsibility are the only days that count in time, 
because they are the only days that give test of quality. 



126 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

They are the only days when manhood and purp)ose is tried 
out as if by fire. I need not tell you young gentlemen that 
you are not like an ordinary graduating class of one of our 
universities. The men in those classes look forward to the 
life which they are to lead after graduation \^^th a great 
many questions in their mind. Most of them do not know 
exactly what their lives are going to develop into. Some 
of them do not know what occupations they are going to 
follow. All of them are conjecturing what will be the line 
of duty and advancement and the ultimate goal of success 
for them. 

There is no conjecture for you. You have enlisted in 
something that does not stop when you leave the Academy, 
for you then only begin to realize it, which then only begins 
to be filled with the full richness of its meaning, and you 
can look forw^ard with absolute certaint>' to the sort of 
thing that you \Aill be obliged to do. 

This has always been true of graduating classes at West 
Point, but the certainty that some of the older classes used 
to look forward to was a dull certainty. Some of the old 
days in the army, I fancy, were not very interesting days. 
Sometim.es men like the present Chief of Stafi', for example, 
could fill their lives v/ith the interest of really knowing and 
understanding the Indians of the Western plains, knowing 
what was going on inside their minds and being able to be 
the intermediary between them and those who dealt with 
them, by speaking their sign language, could enrich their 
lives; but the ordinary life of the average officer at a 
Western post can not have been very exciting, and I think 
with admiration of those dull years through which officers 
who had not a great deal to do insisted, nevertheless, upon 
being efficient and worth Vv'hile and keeping their men fit, at 
any rate, for the duty to which they were assigned. 

But in your case there are many extraordinary possi- 
bilities, because, gentlemen, no man can certainly tell you 
what the immediate future is going to be either in the history 
of this country or in the history of the world. It is not by 
accident that the present great war came in Europe. Every 
element was there, and the contest had to come sooner or 
later, and it is not going to be by accident that the results 



1 



June 13] PREPAREDNESS OF THE SOLDIER 127 

axe worked out, but by purpose — by the purpose of the men 
who are strong enough to have guiding minds and indom- 
itable wills when the time for decision and settlement comes. 
And the part that the United States is to play has this dis- 
tinction in it, that it is to be in any event a disinterested part. 
There is nothing that the United States wants that it has 
to get by war, but there are a great many things that the 
United States has to do. It has to see that its life is not 
interfered with by anybody else who wants something. 

These are days when we are making preparation, when 
the thing most commonly discussed around every sort of 
table, in every sort of circle, in the shops and in the streets, 
is preparedness, and undoubtedly, gentlemen, that is the 
present imperative duty of America, to be prepared. But 
we ought to know what we are preparing for. I remember 
hearing a wise man say once that the old maxim that "every- 
thing comes to the man who waits" is all very well provided 
he knows what he is waiting for; and preparedness might 
be a very hazardous thing if we did not know what we 
wanted to do with the force that we mean to accumulate 
and to get into fighting shape. 

America, fortunately, does know what she wants to do 
^vith her force. America came into existence for a par- 
ticular reason. WTien you look about upon these beautiful 
hills, and up this stately stream, and then let your imagina- 
tion run over the whole body of this great country from 
which you youngsters are drav/n, far and wide, you remem- 
ber that while it had aboriginal inhabitants, while there were 
people living here, there was no civilization which v;e dis- 
placed. It was as if in the Providence of God a continent 
had been kept unused and waiting for a peaceful people who 
loved lifeerty and the rights of men more than they loved 
anything else, to come and set up an unselfish common- 
wealth. It is a very extraordinary thing. You are so 
familiar with American history, at any rate in its general 
character — I don't accuse you of knowing the details of it, 
for I never found the youngster who did— but you are so 
familiar with the general character of American history that 
it does not seem strange to you, but it is a very strange 
history. There is none other like it in the whole annals of 



128 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

mankind — of men gathering out of every civilized nation 
of the world on an unused continent and building up a polity 
exactly to suit themselves, not under the domination of any 
ruling dynasty or of the ambitions of any royal family; 
doing what they pleased with their owti life on a free space 
of land which God had made rich with every resource which 
was necessary for the civilization they meant to build up. 
There is nothing like it. 

Now, what we are preparing to do is to see that nobody 
mars that and that, being safe itself against interference 
from the outside, all of its force is going to be behind its 
moral idea, and mankind is going to know that when America 
speaks she means what she says. I heard a man say to 
another, "If you wish me to consider you witty, I must really 
trouble you to make a joke." We have a right to say to 
the rest of mankind, 'Tf you don't vrant to interfere with 
us, if you are disinterested, we must really trouble you to 
give evidence of that fact." We are not in for anything 
selfish, and we want the whole mighty power of America 
thrown into that scale and not into any other. 

You know that the chief thing that is holding many people 
back from enthusiasm for what is called preparedness is the 
fear of militarism. I want to say a word to you young 
gentlemen about militarism. You are not militarists because 
you are military. Militarism does not consist in the exist- 
ence of an army, not even in the existence of a very great 
army. Militarism is a spirit. It is a point of view. It is a 
system. It is a purpose. The purpose of militarism is to 
use armies for aggression. The spirit of militarism is the 
opposite of the civilian spirit, the citizen spirit. In a country 
where militarism prevails the military man looks down upon 
the civilian, regards him as inferior, thinks of him as intended 
for his, the military man's, support and use; and just so 
long as America is America that spirit and point of view is 
impossible with us. There is as yet in this countr>% so far 
as I can discover, no taint of the spirit of militarism. You 
younfij gentlemen are not preferred in promotion because of 
the families you belong to. You are not drawn into the 
Academy because you belong to certain influential circles. 



June 13] PREPAREDNESS OF THE SOLDIER 129 

You do not come here with a long tradition of miUtary pride 
back of you. 

You are picked out from the citizens of the United States 
to be that part of the force of the United States which makes 
its poHt}^ safe against interference. You are the part of 
American citizens w^ho say to those who would interfere, 
''You must not" and "You shall not." But you are American 
citizens, and the idea I want to leave with you boys to-day 
is this: No matter what comes, always remember that first 
of all you are citizens of the United States before you are 
officers, and that you are officers because you represent in 
your particular profession what the citizenship of the United 
States stands for. There is no danger of militarism if you 
are genuine Americans, and I for one do not doubt that 
\^ou are. W'Tien you begin to have the militaristic spirit — 
not the military spirit, that is all right — then begin to doubt 
whether yoij are Americans or not. 

You know that one thing in which our forefathers took 
pride was this, that the civil power is superior to the military 
power in the United States. Once and again the people of 
the United States have so admired some great military man 
as to make him President of the United States, when he 
became commander-in-chief of all the forces of the United 
States, but he was commander-in-chief because he was Presi- 
dent, not because he had been trained to arms, and his 
authority was civil, not military. I can teach you nothing 
of military power, but I am instructed by the Consitution to 
use you for constitutional and patriotic purposes. And that 
is the only use you care to be put to. That is the only 
use you ought to care to be put to, because, after all, what 
is the use in being an American if you do not know what 
it is? 

You have read a great deal in the books about the pride 
of the old Roman citizen, who always felt like drawing him- 
self to his full height when he said, 'T am a Roman," but as 
compared with the pride that must have risen to his heart, 
our pride has a new distinction, not the distinction of the 
mere imperial power of a great empire, not the distinction 
of being masters of the world, but the distinction of cariy- 



130 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

ing certain lights for the world that the world has never so 
distinctly seen 'before, certain guiding lights of liberty and 
principle and justice. We have drawn our people, as you 
know, from ail parts of the world, and we have been some- 
what disturbed recently, gentlemen, because somiC of those — 
though I believe a very small number — whom we have drawn 
into our citizenship have not taken into their hearts the 
spirit of America and have loved other countries more than 
they loved the country of their adoption ; and we have talked 
a great deal about Americanism. It ought to be a matter of 
pride with us to know what Americanism really consists in. 

Americanism consists in utterly believing in the principles 
of America and putting them first as above anything that 
might by chance come into competition with it. And I, for 
my part, believe that the American test is a spiritual test. 
If a man has to make excuses for what he had done as an 
American, I doubt his Americanism. He ought to know at 
every step of his action that the motive that lies behind what 
he does is a motive which no American need be ashamed of 
for a moment. Now, we ought to put this test to every 
man we know. We ought to let it be known that nobody 
who does not put America first can consort with us. 

But we ought to set them the example. We ought to 
set them the example by thinking American thoughts, by 
entertaining American purposes, and those thoughts and 
purposes will stand the test of example anywhere in the 
world, for they are intended for the betterment of mankind. 

So I have come to say these few words to you to-day, 
gentlemen, for a double purpose; first of all to express my 
personal good wishes to you in your graduation, and my 
personal interest in you, and second of all to remind you 
how we must all stand together in one spirit as lovers and 
servants of America. And tliat means something more than 
lovers and servants merely of the United States. You have 
heard of the Monroe Doctrine, gentlemen. You know that 
we are already spiritual partners with both continents of 
this hemisphere and that America means something which is 
bigger even than the United States, and that we stand here 
with the glorious power of this country ready to swing it 
out into the field of action whenever liberty and inde- 



June 13] PREPAREDNESS OF THE SOLDIER 131 

pendence and political integrity are threatened anywhere in 
the Western Hemisphere. And we are ready — nobody has 
authorized me to say this, but I am sure of it — we are ready 
to join with the other nations of the world in seeing that the 
kind of justice prevails everywhere that we believe in. 

So that you are graduating to-day, gentlemen, into a new 
distinction. Glory attaches to all these men whose names 
we love to recount who have made the annals of the Ameri- 
can Army distinguished. They played the part they were 
called upon to play with honor and with extraordinary char- 
acter and success. I am congratulating you, not because 
you will be better than they, but because you will have a 
wider world of thought and conception to play your part in. 
I am an American, but I do not believe that any of us loves 
a blustering nationality, a nationality with a chip on its 
shoulder, a nationality with its elbows out and its sv/agger on. 

We love that quiet, self-respecting, unconquerable spirit 
which does not strike until it is necessary to strike, and 
then strikes to conquer. Never since I was a youngster have 
I been afraid of the noisy man. I have always been afraid 
of the still man. I have always been afraid of the quiet 
man. I had a classmate at college who was most dangerous 
when he was most affable. When he was maddest he seemed 
to have the sweetest temper in the world. He would ap- 
proach you with the most ingratiating smile, and then you 
knew that every red corpuscle in his blood was up and 
shouting. If you work things off in your elbows, you do 
not work them off in your mind; you do not work them off 
in your purposes. 

So my conception of America is a conception of infinite 
dignity, along with quiet, unquestionable power. I ask you, 
gentlemen, to join with me in that conception, and let us all 
in our several spheres be soldiers together to realize it. 

New York Times, June 14, 19 16. 



132 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT V^HLLSON [1916 
41. DEMOCRACY OF BUSINESS 

(July 10, 1916) 

Address at Salesmanship Congress, Detroit 

* * * Some Democrats had noticed that the inclination 
to suppose that only some persons understood the business 
of America had a tendency to run into the assumption that 
the number of persons who understood that business was 
very small, and that there were only certain groups and asso- 
ciations of gentlemen who were entitled to be trustees of 
that business for the rest of us. I have never subscribed, 
in any walk of life, to the trustee theory. I have always 
been inclined to believe that the business of the w^orld was 
best understood by those men who were in the struggle for 
maintenance not only, but for success. The man who knows 
the strength of the tide is the man who is swimming against 
it, not the man who is floating with it. The man who is 
immersed in the beginnings of business, who is trying to get 
his foothold, who is trying to get other men to believe in 
him and lend him money and trust him to make profitable 
use of that money, is the man who knows what the business 
conditions in the United States are, and I would rather take 
his counsel as to what ought to be done for business than the 
counsel of any established captain of industry. The captain 
of industry is looking backward and the other man is look- 
ing forward. The conditions of business change with every 
generation; change with every decade; are now changing at 
an almost breathless pace, and the men who have made good 
are not feeling the tides as the other men are feeling them. 
The men who have got into the position of captaincy, unless 
they are of unusual fiber, unless they are of unusually catliolic 
sympathy, unless they have continued to touch shoulders 
with the ranks, unless they have continued to keep close 
communion with the men they are employing and the young 
men they are bringing up as their assistants, do not belong 
to the struggle in which we should see that every unreason- 
able obstacle is removed and every reasonable help afforded 
that public policy can afford. 



July lo] DEMOCRACY OF BUSINESS 133 

So I invite your thoughts, in what I sincerely believe to be 
an entirely nonpartisan spirit, to the democracy of business. 
An act was recently passed in Congress that some of the 
most intelligent business men of this country earnestly op- 
posed, — men whom I knew, men whose character I trusted, 
men whose integrity I absolutely believed in. I refer to the 
Federal Reserve Act, by which we intended to take, and suc- 
ceeded in taking credit out of the control of a small number 
of men and making it available to everybody who had real 
commercial assets, and the very men who opposed that act, 
and opposed it conscientiously, now admit that it saved the 
country from a ruinous panic when the stress of war came 
on, and that it is the salvation of every average business 
man who is in the midst of the tides that I Have been trying 
to describe. WTiat does that mean, gentlemen? It means 
that you can get a settled point of view and can conscien- 
tiously oppose progress if you do not need progress yourself. 
That is what it means. I am not impugning the intelligence 
even of the men who opposed these things, because the same 
thing happens to every man if he is not of extraordinary 
make-up, if he can not see the necessity for a thing that he 
does not himself need. When you have abundant credit and 
control of credit, you, of course, do not need that the area 
should be broadened. 

The suspicion is beginning to dawn in many quarters that 
the average man knows the business necessities of the coun- 
try just as well as the extraordinary man does. I believe in 
the ordinary man. If I did not believe in the ordinary man 
I would m.ove out of a democracy and, if I found an en- 
durable monarchy, I would live in it. The very conception 
of America is based upon the validity of the judgments of 
the average man, and I call you to witness that tliere have 
not been many catastrophes in American history. I call 
you to witness that the average judgments of the' voters of 
the United States have been sound judgments. I call you to 
witness that this great impulse of the common opinion has 
been a lifting impulse, and not a depressing impulse. What 
is the object of associations like that which is gathered here 
to-day, this Salesmanship Congress? The moral of it is 
that a few men can not determine the interests of a large 



134 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

body of men, and that the only way to determine them and 
advance them is to have a representative assembly chosen by 
themselves get together and take common counsel regarding 
them. And do you not notice that in every great occupa- 
tion in the United States there is beginning to be more and 
more of this common counsel? And have you not noticed 
that the more common counsel you have the higher the 
standards are that are insisted upon? 

I attended the other day the Congress of the Advertising 
Men, and their motto is ''Truth and fair dealing in what you 
represent your business to be and your goods to be." I have 
no doubt that in every association like this the prevailing 
sentiment is that only by the highest standards — I mean the 
highest moral standards — can you achieve the most perma- 
nent and satisfactory business results. Was that the preva- 
lent conception before these associations were drawn to- 
gether? Have you not found the moral judgment of the 
average man steady the whole process and clarify it? Do 
you not know more after every conference with your fellows 
than you did before? I never went into a committee of 
any kind upon any important public matter, or private 
matter so far as that is concerned, that I did not come out 
with an altered judgment and knowing much more about the 
matter than when I went in; and not only knowing much 
more, but knowing that the common judgment arrived at was 
better than I could have suggested when I went in. That 
is the universal experience of candid men. If it were not 
so, there would be no object in congresses like this. Yet 
whenever we attempt legislation, we find ourselves in this 
case: We are not in the presence of the many who can 
counsel wisely, but we are in the presence of the few who 
counsel too narrowly, and the means by which v;e have been 
trying to break away from that is not by excluding these 
gentlemen who constituted the narrow circles of advice, but 
by associating them with hundreds of thousands of their 
fellow citizens. 

I have had some say that I was not accessible to them, 
and when I inquired into it I found they meant that I did 
not personally invite them. They did not know how to 
come without being invited, and they did not care to come 



July lo] DEMOCRACY OF BUSINESS 135 

if they came upon the same terms with everybody else, 
knowing that everybody else was welcome whom I had time 
to confer with. 

Am I telling you things unobserved by you? Do you not 
know that these things are true? And do you not believe 
with me that the affairs of the Nation can be better con- 
ducted upon the basis of general counsel than upon the 
basis of special counsel? Men are colored and governed 
by their occupations and their surroundings and their habits. 
If I wanted to change the law radically, I would not con- 
sult a lawyer. If I wanted to change business methods 
radically, I would not consult a man who had made a con- 
spicuous success by using the present methods that I wanted 
to change. Not because I would distrust these men, but 
because I would know that they would not change their 
thinking over night, that they would have to go through a 
long process of reacquaintance with the circumstances of 
the time, the new circumstances of the time, before they 
could be converted to my point of view. You get a good 
deal more light on the street than you do in the closet. You 
get a good deal more light by keeping your ears open among 
the rank and file of your fellow citizens than you do in any 
private conference whatever. I would rather hear what the 
men are talking about on the trains and in the shops and by 
the fireside than hear anything else, because I want guidance 
and I know I could get it there, and what I am constantly 
asking is that men should bring me that counsel, because 
I am not privileged to determine things independently of 
this counsel. I am your servant, not your ruler. 

One thing that we are now trying to convert the small 
circles to that the big circles are already converted to is that 
this country needs a merchant marine and ought to get one. 
I have found that I had a great deal more resistance when 
I tried to help business than w^hen I tried to interfere with 
it. I have had a great deal more resistance of counsel, of 
special counsel, when I tried to alter the things that are 
established than w^hen I tried to do anything else. We call 
ourselves a liberal nation, whereas, as a matter of fact, we 
are one of the most conservative nations in the world. If 
you want to make enemies, try to change something. You 



136 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

know why it is. To do things to-day exactly the way you 
did them yesterday saves thinking. It does not cost you 
anything. You have acquired the habit; you know the 
routine; you do not have to plan anything, and it frightens 
you with a hint of exertion to learn that you will have to do 
it a different way to-morrov/. Until I became a college 
teacher, I used to think that the young men were radical, 
but college boys are the greatest conservatives I ever tackled 
in my life, largely because they have associated too much 
with their fathers. What you have to do with them is to 
take them up upon some visionary height and show them 
the map of the world as it is. Do not let them see their 
father's factory. Do not let them see their father's counting- 
house. Let them see the great valleys teeming with labori- 
ous people. Let them see the great struggle of men in 
realms they never dreamed of. Let them see the great emo- 
tional power that is in the world, the great ambitions, the 
great hopes, the great fears. Give them some picture of 
mankind, and then their father's business and every other 
man's business will begin to fall into place. They will see 
that it is an item and not the whole thing; and they will 
sometimes see that the item is not properly related to the 
whole, and what they will get interested in will be to relate 
the item to the v/hole, so that it will form part of the force, 
and not part of the impediment. 

This country, above every country in the world, gentle- 
men, is meant to lift; it is meant to add to the forces that 
improve. It is meant to add to everything that betters the 
world, that gives it better thinking, more honest endeavor, a 
closer grapple of man with man, so that we will all be pulling 
together like one irresistible team in a single harness. That 
is the reason wh}^ it seemed wise to substitute for the harsh 
processes of the law, which merely lays its hand on your 
shoulder after you have sinned and threatens you with 
punishment, some of the milder and more helpful processes of 
counsel. That is the reason the Federal Trade Commission 
was established, — so that men would have some place where 
they could take counsel as to what the law was and what 
the law permitted; and also take counsel as to whether the 
law itself was right and advice had not better be taken as 



July lo] DEMOCRACY OF BUSINESS 137 

to its alteration. The processes of counsel are the only 
processes of accommodation, not the processes of punish- 
ment. Punishment retards but it does not lift up. Punish- 
ment impedes but it does not imnrove. And we ought to 
substitute for the harsh processes of the law, wherever we 
can, the milder and gentler and more helpful processes of 
coimsel. 

* * * There is a task ahead of us of most colossal dif- 
ficulty. We have not been accustomed to the large world 
of international business and we have got to get accustomed 
to it right away. All provincials have got to take a back 
seat. All men who are afraid of competition have got to 
take a back seat. All men who depend upon anything except 
their intelligence and their efficiency have got to take a 
back seat. * * * 

We are done with provincialism in the statesmanship of 
the United States, and we have got to have a view now 
and a horizon as wide as the world itself. And when I 
look around upon an alert company like this, it seems to me 
in my imagination they are almost straining at the leash. 
They are waiting to be let loose upon this great race that is 
now going to challenge our abilities. For my part, I shall' 
look for^vard to the result with absolute and serene confi- 
dence, because the spirit of the United States is an inter- 
national spirit, if we conceive it right. This is not the home 
of any particular race of men. This is not the home 
of any particular set of political traditions. This is a home 
the doors of which have been opened from the first to man- 
kind, to everybody who loved liberty, to everybody whose 
ideal was equality of opportunity, to everybody whose heart 
was m.oved by the fundamental instincts and sympathies of 
humanity. That is America, and now it is as if the nations of 
the world, sampled and united here, were in their new union 
and new common understanding turning about to serve the 
world with all the honest processes of business and of enter- 
prise. I am happy that I should be witnessing the dawn of 
the day when America is indeed to come into her o^mi. 

White House Pamphlet. 



138 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

42. PREPAREDNESS TO PRESERVE PEACE 

(July 10, 19 1 6) 

Address at Toledo 

This is an entire surprise party to me. I did not know I ] 
was going to have the pleasure of stopping long enough to 
address any number of you, but I am very glad indeed to 
give you m}' very cordial greetings and to express my very 
great interest in this interesting city. 

General Sherwood said that there were many things we 
agreed about, there is one thing we disagree about. General 
Sherwood has been opposing preparedness, and I have been 
advocating it, and I am very sorry to have found him on the 
other side. Because, I think, you will bear me witness, 
fellow citizens, that in advocating preparedness I have not 
been advocating hostility. You will bear me witness that I 
have been a persistent friend of peace and that nothing but 
unmistakable necessity will drive me from that position. I 
think it is a matter of sincere congratulation to us that our 
neighbor Republic to the south shows evidences of at last 
believing in our friendly intentions; that while we must pro- 
tect our border and see to it that our sovereignty is not 
impugned, we are ready to respect their sovereignty also, and 
to be their friends, and not their enemies. 

The real uses of intelligence, my fellow citizens, are the 
uses of peace. Any body of men can get up a row, but only 
an intelligent body of men can get together and cooperate. 
Peace is not only a test of a nation's patience; it is also a 
test of whether the nation knows how" to conduct its rela- 
tions or not. It takes time to do intelligent things, and 
it does not take any time to do unintelligent things. I 
can lose my temper in a minute, but it takes me a long 
tim.e to keep it, and I think that if you wTre to subject my 
Scotch-Irish blood to tlie proper kind of analj^sis, you would 
find that it was fighting blood, and that it is prett\5 hard 
for a man born that way to keep quiet and do things in the 
way in which his intelligence tells him he ought to do them. 
I know just as well as that I am standing here that I rep- 



July lo] PREPAREDNESS AxXD PEACE 139 

resent and am the servant of a Nation that loves peace, and 
that loves it upon the proper basis; loves it not because it is 
afraid of anybody; loves it not because it does not under- 
stand and mean to maintain its rights, butt)ecause it knows 
that humanity is something in which we are all linked to- 
gether, and that it behooves the United States, just as long 
as it is possible, to hold off from becoming involved in a strife 
which makes it all the more necessary that some part of the 
world should keep cool while all the rest of it is hot. Here 
in America, for the time being, are the spaces, the cool 
spaces, of thoughtfulness, and so long as we are allowed to 
do so, we ^vill serve and not contend with the rest of our 
fellow men. We are the more inclined to do this because the 
very principles upon w^hich our Government is based are 
principles of common counsel and not of contest. 

So, my fellow citizens, I congratulate myself upon thisi 
opportunity, brief as it is, to give you my greetings and toi 
convey to you my congratulations that the signs that sur-/ 
round us are all signs of peace. 

White House Pamphlet. 



43. LOYALTY 

(July 13, 1916) 

Address at Citizenship Convention, Washington 

I have come here for the simple purpose of expressing my 
very deep interest in what these conferences are intended to 
attain. It is not fair to the great multitudes of hopeful men 
and women w^ho press into this country from other countries 
that we should leave them without that friendly and inti- 
mate instruction which will enable them very soon after they 
come to find out what America is like at heart and what 
America is intended for among the nations of the world. 

I believe that the chief school that these people must 
attend after they get here is the school which all of us 
attend, which is furnished by the life of the communities in 
which we live and the nation to v/hich we belong. It has 



140 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

been a very touching thought to me sometimes to think of 
tht hopes which have drawn these people to America. I 
have no doubt that many a simple soul has been thrilled by 
that great statue standing in the harbor of New York and 
seeming to lift the light of liberty for the guidance of the 
feet of men ; and I can imagine that they have expected here 
something ideal in the treatment that they will receive, 
something ideal in the laws which they would have to live 
under, and it has caused me many a time to turn upon myself 
the eye of examination to see whether there burned in me the 
true light of the American spirit which the\^ expected to find 
here. It is easy, my fellow-citizens, to communicate physical 
lessons, but it is very difficult to communicate spiritual les- 
sons. America was intended to be a spirit among the nations 
of the world, and it is the purpose of conferences like this 
to find out the best way to introduce the newcomers to this 
spirit, and by that very interest in them to enhance and 
purify in ourselves the thing that ought to make America 
great and not only ought to make her great, but ought to 
m?ke her exhibit a spirit unlike any other nation in the 
world. 

I have never been among those who felt comfortable in 
boasting of the superiority of America over other countries. 
The way to cure yourself of that is to travel in other coun- 
tries and find out how much of nobility and character and 
fine enterprise there is everywhere in the world. The most 
that America can hope to do is to show, it may be, the finest 
example, not the only example, of the things that ought to 
benefit and promote the progress of the world. 

So my interest in this movement is as much an interest in 
ourselves as in those vvhom we are trying to Americanize, 
because if we are genuine Americans they cannot avoid the 
infection; v/hereas, if we are not genuine Americans, there 
will be nothing to infect them with, and no amount of teach- 
ing, no amount of exposition of the Constitution, — which I 
find very fev; persons understand, — no amount of dwelling 
upon the idea of liberty and of justice will accomplish the 
object we have in view, unless we ourselves illustrate the 
idea of justice and of liberty. My interest in this move- 
ment is, therefore, a two-fold interest. I believe it will assist 



July 13] LOYALTY 141 

us to become self-conscious in respect of the fundamental 
ideas of American life. When you ask a man to be loyal to a 
government, if 'he comes from some foreign countries, his 
idea is that he is expected to be loyal to a certain set of per- 
sons like a ruler or a body set in authority over him, but 
that is not the American idea. Our idea is that he is to be 
loyal to certain objects in life, and that the only reason he 
has a President and a Congress and a Governor and a State 
Legislature and courts is that the community shall have 
instrumentalities by which to promote those objects. It is a 
cooperative organization expressing itself in this Constitu- 
tion, expressing itself in these laws, intending to express 
itself in the exposition of those laws by the courts; and the 
idea of America is not so much that men are to be restrained 
and punished by the law as instructed and guided by the law. 
That is the reason so many hopeful reforms come to grief. 
A law cannot work until it expresses the spirit of the com- 
munity for which it is enacted, and if you try to enact 
into law what expresses only the spirit of a small coterie or 
of a small minority, you know, or at any rate you ought to 
know, beforehand that it is not going to work. The object 
of the law is that there, written upon these pages, the citizen 
should read the record of the experience of this state and 
nation; what they have concluded it is necessary for them 
to do because of the life they have lived and the things 
that they have discovered to be elements in that life. So 
that we ought to be careful to maintain a government at 
which the immigrant can look with the closest scrutiny and 
to which he should be at liberty to address this question: 
"You declare this to be a land of liberty and of equality and 
of justice; have you made it so by your law?" We ought 
to be able in our schools, in our night schools and in every 
other method of instructing these people, to show them 
that that has been our endeavor. We cannot conceal from 
them long the fact that we are just as human as any other 
nation, that we are just as selfish, that there are just as many 
mean people amongst us as anywhere else, that there are just 
as many people here who want to take advantage of other 
people as you can find in other countries, just as nmny cruel 
people, just as many people heartless when it comes to main- 



142 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

taming and promoting their own interest; but you can show 
that our object is to get these people in harness and see to it 
that they do not do any damage and are not allowed to 
indulge the passions which would bring injustice and calam- 
ity at last upon a nation whose object is spiritual and not 
material. 

America has built up a great body of wealth. America 
has become, from the physical point of view, one of the 
most powerful nations in the world, a nation which if it took 
the pains to do so, could build that power up into one of 
the most formidable instruments in the world, one of the 
most formidable instruments of force, but which has no other 
idea than to use its force for ideal objects and not for self- 
aggrandizement. 

We have been disturbed recently, my fellow-citizens, by 
certain symptoms which have showed themselves in our body 
politic. Certain men, — I have never believed a great num- 
ber, — born in other lands, have in recent months thought 
more of those lands than they have of the honor and interest 
of the government under which they are now living. They 
have even gone so far as to draw^ apart in spirit and in organ- 
ization from the rest of us to accomplish some special object 
of their own. I am not here going to utter any criticism of 
these people, but I want to say this, that such a thing as 
that is absolutely incompatible with the fundamental idea of 
loyalty, and that loyalty is not a self-pleasing virtue. I am 
not bound to be loyal to the United States to please myself. 
I am bound to be loyal to the United States because I live 
under its laws and am its citizen, and whether it hurts me 
or whether it benefits me, I am obliged to be loyal. Loyalty 
means nothing unless it has at its heart the absolute principle 
of self-sacrifice. Loyalty means that you ought to be ready 
to sacrifice every interest that you have, and your life itself, 
if your country calls upon you to do so, and that is the sort 
of loyalty which ought to be inculcated into these newcomers, 
that they are not to be loyal only so long as they are pleased, 
but that, having once entered into this sacred relationship, 
they are bound to be loyal whether they are pleased or not ; 
and that loyalty which is merely self-pleasing is only self- 
indulgence and selfishness. No man has ever risen to the 



July 13] LOYALTY 143 

real stature of spiritual manhood until he has found that it 
is finer to serve somebody else than it is to serve himself. 

These are the conceptions which we ought to teach the 
newcomers into our midst, and we ought to realize that the 
life of every one of us is part of the schooling, and that we 
cannot preach loyalty unless we set the example, that we 
cannot profess things with any influence upon others unless 
we practice them also. This process of Americanization is 
going to be a process of self-examination, a process of puri- 
fication, a process of rededication to the things v^hich America 
represents and is proud to represent. And it takes a great 
deal more courage and steadfastness, my fellow-citizens, to 
represent ideal things than to represent anything else. It is 
easy to lose your temper, and hard to keep it. It is easy to 
strike and sometimes very difficult to refrain from striking, 
and I think you will agree with me that we are most justified 
in being proud of doing the things that are hard to do and 
not the things that are easy. You do not settle things 
quickly by taking what seems to be the quickest way to 
settle them. You may make the complication just that 
much the more profound and inextricable, and, therefore, 
what I believe America should exalt above everything else is 
the sovereignty of thoughtfulness and sympathy and vision 
as against the grosser impulses of miankind. Xo nation can 
live without vision, and no vision will exalt a nation except 
the vision of real liberty and real justice and purity of con- 
duct. 

White House Pamphlet. 



44. AN EIGHT-HOUR DAY FOR RAILROAD MEN 

(August 29, 19 1 6) 

Address to Congress 

I have come to you to seek your assistance in dealing with 
a very grave situation which has arisen out of the demand 
of the employees of the railroads engaged in freight train 
service that they be granted an eight-hour working day, 



144 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

safeguarded by payment for an hour and a half of service 
for every hour of work beyond the eight. 

The matter has been agitated for more than a year. The 
public has been made familiar with the demands of the men 
and the arguments urged in favor of them, and even more 
familiar with the objections of the railroads and their counter 
demand that certain priviliges now enjoyed by their men 
and certain bases of payment worked out through many years 
of contest be reconsidered, especially in their relation to the 
adoption of an eight-hour day. The matter came some three 
weeks ago to a final issue and resulted in a complete deadlock 
between the parties. The means provided by law for the 
mediation of the controversy failed and the means of arbitra- 
tion for which the law provides were rejected. The represen- 
tatives of the railway executives proposed that the demands 
of the men be submitted in their entirety to arbitration, along 
with certain questions of readjustment as to pay and condi- 
tions of employment which seemed to them to be either closely 
associated with the demands or to call for reconsideration on 
their own. merits; the men absolutely declined arbitration, 
especially if any of their established privileges were by that 
means to be drawn again in question. The law in the matter 
put no compulsion upon them. The four hundred thousand 
men from whom the demands proceeded had voted to strike 
if their demands were refused; the strike was imminent; it 
has since been set for the fourth of September next. It affects 
the men who man the freight trains on practically every rail- 
way in the country. The freight service throughout the 
United States must stand still until their places are filled, if, 
indeed, it should prove possible to fill them at all. Cities 
will be cut off from their food supplies, the whole commerce 
of the nation will be paralyzed, men of every sort and occu- 
pation will be thrown out of employment, countless thousands 
will in all likelihood be brought, it may be, to the very point 
of starvation, and a tragical national calamity brought on, 
to be added to the other distresses of the time, because no 
basis of accommodation or settlement has been found. 

Just as soon as it became evident that mediation under 
the existing law had failed and that arbitration had been 
rendered impossible by the attitude of the men, I considered 



Ang. 29] EIGHT HOURS FOR RAILROAD MEN 145 

it my duty to confer with the representatives of both the 
railways and the brotherhoods, and myself offer mediation, 
not as an arbitrator, but merely as spokesman of the nation, 
in the interest of justice, indeed, and as a friend of both 
parties, but not as judge, only as the representative of one 
hundred millions of men, w^omen, and children who would 
pay the price, the incalculable price, of loss and suffering 
should these few men insist upon approaching and concluding 
the matters in controversy between them merely as employers 
and employees, rather than as patriotic citizens of the United 
States looking before and after and accepting the larger re- 
sponsibility w^hich the public would put upon them. 

It seemed to me, in considering the subject-matter of the 
controversy, that the whole spirit of the time and the pre- 
ponderant evidence of recent economic experience spoke for 
the eight-hour day. It has been adjudged by the thought and 
experience of recent years a thing upon which society is 
justified in insisting as in the interest of health, efficiency, 
contentment, and a general increase of economic vigor. The 
whole presumption of modem experience w^ould, it seemed to 
me, be in its favor, whether there was arbitration or not, and 
the debatable points to settle were those w^hich arose out of 
the acceptance of the eight-hour day rather than those which 
affected its establishment. I, therefore, proposed that the 
eight-hour day be adopted by the railway managements and 
put into practice for the present as a substitute for the exist- 
ing ten-hour basis of pay and service; that I should appoint, 
with the permiission of the Congress, a small commission to 
observe the results of the change, carefully studying the fig- 
ures of the altered operating costs, not only, but also the 
conditions of labor under which the men worked and the 
operation of their existing agreements with the railroads, 
with instructfons to report the facts as they found them to 
the Congress at the earliest possible day, but without recom- 
mendation; and that, after the facts had been thus disclosed, 
an adjustment should in som.e orderly manner be sought of 
all the matters now left unadjusted between the railroad 
managers and the men. 

These proposals were exactly in line, it is interesting to 
note, with the position taken by the Supreme Court of the 



146 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

United States when appealed to to protect certain litigants 
from the financial losses which they confidently expected if 
they should submit to the regulation of their charges and 
of their methods of service by public legislation. The Court 
has held that it would not undertake to form a judgment upon 
forecasts, but could base its action only upon actual ex- 
perience; that it must be supplied with facts, not with calcu- 
lations and opinions, however scientifically attempted. To 
undertake to arbitrate the question of the adoption of an 
eight-hour day in the lights of results merely estimated and 
predicted would be to undertake an enterprise of conjecture. 
No wise man could undertake it, or, if he did undertake it, 
could feel assured of his conclusions. 

I unhesitatingly offered the friendly services of the admin- 
istration to the railway managers to see to it that justice 
was done the railroads in the outcome. I felt warranted in 
assuring them that no obstacle of law would be suffered to 
stand in the way of their increasing their revenues to meet 
the expenses resulting from the change "So far as the develop- 
ment of their business and of their administrative efficiency 
did not prove adequate to meet them. The public and the 
representatives of the public, I felt justified in assuring them, 
were disposed to nothing but justice in such- cases and were 
willing to serve those who served them. 

The representatives of the brotherhoods accepted the plan ; 
but the representatives of the railroads declined to accept it. 
In the face of what I cannot but regard as the practical cer- 
tainty that they vAU be ultimately obliged to accept the 
eight-hour day by the concerted action of organized labor, 
backed by the favorable judgment of society, the representa- 
tives of the railway management have felt justified in de- 
clining a peaceful settlement which would engage all the 
forces of justice, public and private, on their*, side to take 
care of the event. They fear the hostile influence of ship- 
pers, who would be opposed to an increase of freight rates 
(for which, however, of course, the public itself would pay) ; 
they apparently feel no confidence that the Interstate Com- 
merce Commission could withstand the objections that would 
be made. They do not care to rely upon the friendly assur- 
ances of the Congress or the President. They have thought 



Aug. 29] EIGHT HOURS FOR RAILROAD MEN 147 

it best that they should be forced to yield, if they must yield, 
not by counsel, but by the suffering of the country. Wliile 
my conferences with them were in progress, and when to all 
outward appearance those conferences had come to a stand- 
still, the representatives of the brotherhoods suddenly acted 
and set the strike for the fourth of September. 

The railway managers based their decision to reject my 
counsel in this matter upon their conviction that they must 
at any cost to themselves or to the country stand firm for 
the principle of arbitration which the men had rejected. I 
based my counsel upon the indisputable fact that there was 
no means of obtaining arbitration. The law supplied none; 
earnest efforts at mediation had failed to influence the men in 
the least. To stand firm for the principle of arbitration and 
yet not get arbitration seemed to me futile, and something 
more than futile, because it involved incalculable distress to 
the country and consequences in some respects worse than 
those of war, and that in the midst of peace. 

I yield to no man in firm adherence, alike of conviction 
and of purpose, to the principle of arbitration in industrial 
disputes; but matters have come to a sudden crisis in this 
particular dispute and the country had been caught unpro- 
vided with any practicable means of enforcing that conviction 
in practice (by w^hose fault we will not now stop to inquire). 
A situation had to be met whose elements and fixed condi- 
tions were indisputable. The practical and patriotic course 
to pursue, as it seemed to me, was to secure immediate peace 
by conceding the one thing in the demands of the men which 
society itself and any arbitrators who represented public 
sentiment were most likely to approve, and immediately lay 
the foundations for securing arbitration with regard to every- 
thing else involved. The event has confirmed that judgment. 
I was seeking to compose the present in order to safeguard 
the future; for I wished an atmosphere of -peace and friendly 
cooperation in which to take counsel with .the representa- 
tives of the nation with regard to the best means for provid- 
ing, so far as it might prove possible to provide, against the 
recurrence of such unhappy situations in the future, — the 
best and most practicable means of securing calm and fair 
arbitration of all industrial disputes in the days to come. 



148 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

This is assuredly the best way of vindicating a principle, 
namely, having failed to make certain of its observance 
in the present, to make certain of its observance in the fu- 
ture. 

But I could only propose. I could not govern the will of 
others v^ho took an entirely different view of the circum- 
stances of the case, who even refused to admit the circum- 
stances to be what they have turned out to be. 

Having failed to bring the parties to this critical contro- 
versy to an accommodation, therefore, I turn to you, deeming 
it clearly our duty as public servants to leave nothing undone 
that we can do to safeguard the life and interests of the 
nation. In the spirit of such a purpose, I earnestly recom- 
mend the following legislation: 

First, immediate provision for the enlargement and admin- 
istrative reorganizaton of the Interstate Commerce Commis- 
sion along the lines embodied in the bill recently passed by 
the House of Representatives and now awaiting action by 
the Senate; in order that the Commission may be enabled 
to deal with the many great and various duties now devolving 
upon it with a promptness and thoroughness which are Avith 
its present constitution and means of action practically im- 
possible. 

Second, the establishment of an eight-hour day as the legal 
basis alike of work and of wages in the employment of all 
railway employees who are actually engaged in the work of 
operating trains in interstate transportation. 

Third, the authorization of the appointment by the Presi- 
dent of a small body of men to observe the actual results in 
experience of the adoption of the eight-hour day in railway 
transportation alike for the men and for the railroads; its 
effects in the matter of operating costs, in the application of 
the existing practices and agreements to the new conditions, 
and in all other practical aspects, with the provision that the 
investigators shall report their conclusions to the Congress at 
the earliest possible date, but without recommendation as 
to legislative action; in order that the public may learn from 
an unprejudiced source just what actual developments have 
ensued. 

Fourth, explicit approval by the Congress of the consider- 



Aug. 29] EIGHT HOURS FOR RAILROAD MEN 149 

ation by the Interstate Commerce Commission of an increase 
of freight rates to meet such additional expenditures by the 
railroads as may have been rendered necessary by the adop- 
tion of the eight-hour day and which have not been offset 
by administrative readjustments and economies, should the 
facts disclosed justify the increase. 

Fifth, an amendment of the existing federal statute which 
provides for the mediation, conciliation, and arbitration of 
such controversies as the present by adding to it a provision 
that in case the methods of accommodation now provided 
for should fail, a full public investigation of the merits of 
every such dispute shall be institutea and completed before 
a strike or lockout may lawfully be attempted. 

And, sixth, the lodgment in the hands of the Executive of 
the power, in case of military necessity, to take control of 
such portions and such rolling stock of the railways of the 
country as may be required for military use and to operate 
them for military purposes, with authority to draft into the 
military service of the United States such train crews and 
administrative officials as the circumstances require for their 
safe and efficient use. 

This last suggestion I make because we cannot in any 
circumstances suffer the nation to be hampered in the essen- 
tial matter of national defense. At the present mom.ent cir- 
cumstances render this duty particularly obvious. Almost 
the entire military force of the nation is stationed upon the 
Mexican border to guard our territory against hostile raids. 
It must be supplied, and steadily supplied, with whatever it 
needs for its maintenance and efficiency. If it should be 
necessary for purposes of national defense to transfer any 
portion of it upon short notice to some other part of the 
country, for reasons now unforeseen, ample means of trans- 
portation must be available, and available without delay. 
The power confessed in this matter should be carefully and 
explicitly lim.ited to cases of military necessity, but in all 
such cases it should be cleam and ample. 

There is one other thing we should do if we are true cham- 
pions of arbitration. We should make all arbitral awards 
judgments by record of a court of law in order that their 
interpretation and enforcement may lie, not with one of the 



150 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

parties to the arbitration, but with an impartial and authori- 
tative tribunal. 

These things I urge upon you, not in haste or merely as a 
means of meeting a present emergency, but as permanent 
and necessary additions to the law of the land, suggested, 
indeed, by circumstances we had hoped never to see, but im- 
perative as well as just, if such emergencies are to be pre- 
vented in the future. I feel that no extended argument is 
needed to commend them to your favorable consideration. 
They demonstrate themselves. The time and the occasion 
only give emphasis to their importance. We need them now 
and we shall continue to need them. 

White House Pamphlet. 



45. ABRAHAM LINCOLN ' 
(September 4, 19 1 6) 

i 

Address at the Lincoln Birthplace Farm, at Hodgen- \ 

VILLE 

No more significant memorial could have been presented ■ 

to the nation than this. It expresses so much of what is \ 

singular and noteworthy in the history of the country; it ' 

suggests so many of the things that we prize most highly in ' 

our life and in our system of government. How eloquent this 1 
little house within this shrine is of the vigor of democracy! 

There is nowhere in the land any home so remote, so humble, ' 

that it may not contain the power of m.ind and heart ?.nd i 

conscience to which nations yield and history submits its ! 

processes. Nature pays no tribute to aristocracy, subscribes I 
to no creed of caste, renders fealty to no monarch or master 

of any name or kind. Genius is no snob. It does not run • 

after titles or seek by preference the high circles of society. | 

It affects humble company as well as great. It pays no spe- | 

cial tribute to universities or learned societies or conventional , 

standards of greatness, but serenely chooses its own com- ' 
rades, its own haunts, its own cradle even, and its own life 

of adventure and of training. Here is proof of it. This little ' 



Sept. 4] ABRAHAM LINCOLN 151 

hut was the cradle of one of the great sons of men, a man of 
singular, delightful, vital genius who presently emerged upon 
the great stage of the nation's history, gaunt, shy, ungainly, 
but dominant and majestic, a natural ruler of men, himself 
inevitably the central figure of the great plot. No man can 
explain this, but every man can see how it demonstrates the 
vigor of democracy, where every door is open, in every hamlet 
and countryside, in city and wilderness alike, for the ruler 
to emerge when he will and claim his leadership in the free 
life. Such are the authentic proofs of the validity and vital- 
ity of democracy. 

Here, no less, hides the mystery of democracy. Who shall 
guess this secret of nature and providence and a free polity? 
Whatever the vigor and vitality of the stock from which he 
sprang, its mere vigor and soundness do not explain where 
this man got his great heart that seemed to comprehend all 
mankind in its catholic and benignant sympathy, the mind 
that sat enthroned behind those brooding, melancholy eyes, 
whose vision swept many an horizon which those about him 
dreamed not of, — that mind that comprehended what it had 
never seen, and understood the language of affairs with the 
ready ease of one to the manner bom, — or that nature which 
seemed in its varied richness to be the familiar of men of 
every way of life. This is the sacred mystery of democ- 
racy, that its richest fruits spring up out of soils which no 
man has prepared and in circumstances amidst which they 
are the least experienced. This is a place alike of mystery 
and of reassurance. 

It is likely that in a society ordered otherwise than our 
own Lincoln could not have found himself or the path of 
fame and power upon which he walked serenely to his death. 
In this place it is right that we should remind ourselves of 
the solid and striking facts upon which our faith in democ- 
racy is founded. Many another man besides Lincoln has 
served the nation in its highest places of counsel and of 
action whose origins were as humble as his. Though the 
greatest example of the universal energy, richness, stimula- 
tion, and force of democracy, he is only one example among 
many. The permeating and all-pervasive virtue of the free- 
dom which diallenges us in America to make the most of 



152 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

every gift and power we possess every page of our history 
serves to emphasize and illustrate. Standing here in this 
place, it seems almost the whole of the stirring story. 

Here Lincoln had his beginnings. Here the end and con- 
summation of that great life seem remote and a bit incredible. 
And yet there was no break anywhere between beginning and 
end, no lack of natural sequence anywhere. Nothing really 
incredible happened. Lincoln was unaffectedly as much at 
home in the White House as he was here. Do you share with 
me the feeling, I wonder, that he was permanently at home 
nowhere? It seems to me that in the case of a man, — I 
would rather say of a spirit, — like Lincoln the question where 
he was is of little significance, that it is always what he was 
that really arrests our thought and takes hold of our imagina- 
tion. It is the spirit alwa3^s that is sovereign. Lincoln, like 
the rest of us, was put through the discipline of the world, — 
a very rough and exacting discipline for him, an indispen- 
sable discipline for every man who would know what he is 
about in the midst of the world's affairs; but his spirit got 
only its schooling there. It did not derive its character or 
its vision from the experiences which brought it to its full 
revelation. The test of every American must always be, not 
where he is, but what he is. That, also, is of the essence of 
democracy, and is tlie moral of which this place is most 
gravely expressive. 

We would like to think of men like Lincoln and Washing- 
ton as tj^pical Americans, but no man can be typical who is 
so unusual as these great men were. It was t}'pical of Amer- 
ican life that it should produce such men with supreme in- 
difference as to the manner in which it produced them, and 
as readily here in this hut as amidst the little circle of culti- 
vated gentlemen to whom Virginia owed so much in leader- 
ship and example. And Lincoln and Washington were typical 
Americans in the use thty made of their genius. But there 
will be few such men at best, and v/e will not look into the 
m3^stery of how and Vv^hy they come. We will only keep 
the door open for them always, and a hearty welcome, — 
after we have recognized them. 

I have read many biographies of Lincoln; I have sought 
out with the greatest interest the many intimate stories that 



Sept. 4] ABRAHAM LINCOLN 153 

are told of him, the narratives of nearby friends, the sketches 
at close quarters, in which those who had the privilege of 
being associated with him have tried to depict for us the very 
man himself "in his habit as he lived;" but I have nowhere 
found a real intimate of Lincoln's. I nowhere get the im- 
pression in any narrative or reminiscence that the writer 
had in fact penetrated to the heart of his mystery, or that 
any man could penetrate to the heart of it. That brooding 
spirit had on real familiars. I get the impression that it never 
spoke out in complete self -revelation, and that it could not 
reveal itself completely to anyone. It was a very lonely 
spirit that looked out from underneath those shaggy brows 
and comprehended men without fully communing with them, 
as if, in spite of all its genial efforts at comradeship, it dwelt 
apart, saw its visions of duty where no man looked on. 
There is a very holy and very terrible isolation for the con- 
science of every man who seeks to read the destiny in affairs 
for others as well as for himself, for a nation as well as for 
individuals. That privacy no man can intrude upon. That 
lonely search of the spirit for the right perhaps no man can 
assist. This strange child of the cabin kept company with 
invisible things, was bom into no intimacy but that of its 
own silently assembling and deploying thoughts. 

I have come here today, not to utter an eulogy on Lincoln ; 
he stands in need of none, but to endeavor to interpret the 
meaning of this gift to the nation of the place of his birth 
and origin. Is not this an altar upon which we may forever 
keep alive the vestal fire of democracy as upon a shrine at 
which some of the deepest and most sacred hopes of man- 
kind may from age to age be rekindled? For these hopes 
must constantly be rekindled, and only those who live can 
rekindle them. The only stuff that can retain the life-giving 
heat is the stuff of living hearts. And the hopes of mankind 
cannot be kept alive by w^ords merely, by constitutions and 
doctrines of right and codes of liberty. The object of democ- 
racy is to translate these into the life and action of society, 
the self-denial and self-sacrifice of heroic men and women 
willing to make their lives an embodiment of right and serv- 
ice and enlightened purpose. The commands of democracy 
are as imperative as its privileges and opportunities are wide 



154 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

and generous. Its compulson is upon us. It will be great 
and lift a great light for the guidance of the nations only if 
we are great and carry that light high for the guidance of 
our own feet. We are not worthy to stand here unless we 
ourselves be in deed and in truth real democrats and servants 
of mankind, ready to give our very lives for the freedom and 
justice and spiritual exaltation of the great nation which 
shelters and nurtures us. 

White House Pamphlet. 



46. THE FORCES OF FREEDOM 

(September 8, 19 16) 
Address at Suffrage Convention, Atlantic City 

I have found it a real privilege to be here to-night and to 
listen to the addresses which you have heard. Though you 
may not all of you believe it, I would a great deal rather hear 
somebody else speak than speak myself; but I should feel 
that I was omitting a duty if I did not address you to-night 
and say some of the things that have been in my thought as 
I realized the approach of this evening and the duty that 
would fall upon me. 

The astonishing thing about the movement which you 
represent is, not that it has grown so slowly, but that it has 
grown so rapidly. No doubt for those who have been a long 
time in the struggle, like your honored president, it seems 
a long and arduous path that has been trodden, but when you 
think of the cumulative force of this movement in recent 
decades, you must agree with me that it is one of the most 
astonishing tides in modern history. Two generations ago, 
no doubt Madam President will agree with me in saying, it 
was a handful of women who were fighting this cause. Now 
it is a great multitude of women who are fighting it. 

And there are some interesting historical connections which 
I would like to attempt to point out to you. One of the most 
striking facts about the history of the United States is that 



Sept. 8] THE FORCES OF FREEDOM 155 

at the outset it was a lawyers' history. Almost all of the 
questions to which America addressed itself, say a hundred 
years ago, were legal questions, were questions of method, 
not questions of what you were going to do with your Gov- 
ernment, but questions of how you were going to constitute 
your Government, — how you were going to balance the powers 
of the States and the Federal Government, how you were 
going to balance the claims of property against the processes 
of liberty, how you were going to make your governments 
up so as to balance the parts against each other so that the 
legislature would check the executive, and the executive the 
legislature, and the courts both of them put together. The 
whole conception of government when the United States be- 
came a Nation was a mechanical conception of government, 
and the mechanical conception of government which underlay 
it was the Newtonian theory of the universe. If you pick up 
the Federalist, some parts of it read like a treatise on astron- 
omy instead of a treatise on government. They speak of the 
centrifugal an^ the centripital forces, and locate the Presi- 
dent somewhere in a rotating system. The whole thing is a 
calculation of power and an adjustment of parts. There was 
a time when nobody but a lawyer could know enough to run 
the Government of the United States, and a distinguished 
English publicist once remarked, speaking of the complexity 
of the American Government, that it was no proof of the 
excellence of the American Constitution that it had been 
successfully operated, because the Americans could run any 
constitution. But there have been a great many technical 
difficulties in running it. 

And then something happened. A great question arose 
in this country v/hich, though complicated with legal ele- 
ments, was at bottom a human question, and nothing but a 
question of humanity. That was the slavery question. And 
is it not significant that it was then, and then for the first 
time, that women becam.e prominent in politics in America? 
Not many women; those prominent in that day were so few 
that you can name them over in a brief catalogue, but, never- 
theless, they then began to play a part in writing, not only, 
but in public speech, which was a very novel part for women 



156 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

to play in America. After the Civil War had settled some 
of what seemed to be the most difficult legal questions of our 
system, the life of the Nation began not only to unfold, but 
to accumulate. Life in the United States was a compara- 
tively simple matter at the time of the Civil War. There 
was none of that underground struggle which is now so 
manifest to those who look only a little way beneath the sur- 
face. Stories such as Dr. Davis has told to-night were 
uncommon in those simpler days. The pressure of low 
v/ages, the agony of obscure and unremunerated toil, did 
not exist in America in anything like the same proportions 
that they exist now. And as our life has unfolded and 
accumulated, as the contacts of it have become hot, as the 
populations have assembled in the cities, and the cool spaces 
of the country have been supplanted by the feverish urban 
areas, the whole nature of our political questions has been 
altered. They have ceased to be legal questions. They have 
more and more become social questions, questions with re- 
gard to the relations of human beings to one another. — not 
merely their legal relations, but their moral and spiritual 
relations to one another. This has been most characteristic 
of American life in the last few decades, and as these ques- 
tions have assumed greater and greater prominence, the 
movement which this association represents has gathered 
cumulative force. So that, if anybody asks himself, "What 
does this gathering force mean," if he knows anything about 
• the history of the country, he knows that it means something 
that has not only come to stay, but has come with conquering 
power. 

I get a little impatient sometimes about the discussion of 
the channels and methods by which it is to prevail. It is 
going to prevail, and that is a very superficial and ignorant 
view of it which attributes it to mere social unrest. It is 
not merely because the women are discontented. It is be- 
cause the women have seen visions of duty, and that is 
something which we not only can not resist, but, if we be 
true Americans, we do not wish to resist. America took its 
origin in visions of the human spirit, in aspirations for the 
deepest sort of liberty of the mind and of the heart, and as 
visions of that sort come up to the sight of those who are 



Sept. 8] THE FORCES OF FREEDOM 157 

spiritually minded in America, America comes more and 
more into her birthright and into the perfection of her de- 
velopment. 

So that what we have to realize in dealing with forces of 
this sort is that we are dealing with the substance of life 
itself. I have felt as I sat here to-night the wholesome con- 
tagion of the occasion. Almost every other time that I ever 
visited Atlantic City, I came to fight somebody. I hardly 
know how to conduct myself when I have not come to fight 
against anybody, but with somebody. I have come to sug- 
gest, among other things, that when the forces of nature 
are steadily working and the tide is rising to meet the moon, 
you need not be afraid that it will not come to its flood. 
We feel the tide; we rejoice in the strength of it; and we 
shall not quarrel in the long run as to the method of it. 
Because, when you are working with masses of men and 
organized bodies of opinion, you have got to carry the organ- 
ized body along. The whole art and practice of government 
consists, not in moving individuals, but in moving masses. 
It is all very well to run ahead and beckon, but, after all, 
you have got to wait for the body to follow. I have not come 
to ask you to be patient, because you have been, but I have 
come to congratulate you that there was a force behind you 
that will beyond any peradventure be triumphant, and for 
which you can afford a little while to vvait. 

White House Pamphlet. 



47. WORLD BUSINESS OF AMERICA 

(September 25, 1916) 

Address to the Grain Dealers' Association, at 
Baltimore 

* * * I have come to discuss the general relation of the 
United States to the business of the world in the decades 
immediately ahead of us. We have swung out, my fellow 
citizens, into a new business era in America. I suppose that 
there is no man connected with your association who does 



158 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

not remember the time when the whole emphasis of Ameri- 
can business discussion w^as laid upon the domestic market. 
I need not remind you how recently it has happened that our 
attention has been extended to the markets of the world; 
much less recently, I need not say, in the matters with which 
you are concerned than in the other export interests of the 
country. But it happened that American production, not 
only in the agricultural field and in mining and in all the 
natural products of the earth, but also in manufacture, in- 
creased in recent years to such a volume that American busi- 
ness burst its jacket. It could not any longer be taken care 
of within the field of the domestic markets; and when that 
began to disclose itself as the situation, we also became aware 
that American business men had not studied foreign mar- 
kets, that they did not know the commerce of the world, 
and that they did not have the ships in which to take their 
proportionate part in the carrying trade of the world; that 
our merchant marine had sunk to a negligible amount, and 
that it had sunk to its lowest at the very time when the tide 
of our exports began to grow in most formidable volume. 

One of the most interesting circumstances of our business 
history is this: The banking laws of the United States, — I 
mean the Federal banking lav/s, — did not put the national 
banks in a position to do foreign exchange under favorable 
conditions, and it was actually true that private banks, and 
sometimes branch banks drawn out of other countries, notably 
out of Canada, were established at our chief ports to do what 
Am.erican bankers ought to have done. It was as if America 
was not only unaccustomed to touching all the nerves of the 
w^orld's business, but vras disinclined to touch them, and had 
not prepared the instrumentality by which it might take part 
in the great commerce of the round globe. Only in very 
recent years have we been even studying the problem of 
providing ourselves with the instrumentalities. Not until 
the recent legislation of Congress known as the Federal re- 
serve act were the Federal banks of this country given the 
proper equipment through which they could assist American 
commerce, not only in our own country, but in any part 
of the world where they chose to set up branch institutions. 
British banks had been serving British merchants all over 



Sept. 25] WORLD BUSINESS OF AMERICA 159 

the world, German banks had been serving German mer- 
chants all over the world, and no national bank of the United 
States had been serving American merchants anywhere in 
the world except in the United States. We had, as it were, 
deliberately refrained from playing our part in the field in 
which we prided ourselves that we were most ambitious and 
most expert, the field of manufacture and of commerce. All 
that is past, and the scene has been changed by the events 
of the last two years, almost suddenly, and with a complete- 
ness that almost daunts the planning mind. Not only when 
this war is over, but now, America has her place in the world 
and must take her place in the world of finance and com- 
merce upon a scale that she never dreamed of before. 

My dream is that she will take her place in that great field 
in a new spirit which the world has never seen before ; not the 
spirit of those who would exclude others, but the spirit of 
those who would excel others. I want to see America pitted 
against the world, not in selfishness, but in brains. The first 
thing that brains have to feed upon is knowledge, and when 
I hear men proposing to deal with the business problems of 
the United States in the future as we dealt with them in the 
past, I do not have to inquire any further whether they are 
equipped with knowledge. I dismiss them from the reckon- 
ing, because I know that the facts are going to dominate 
and they know nothing about the facts. And the most that 
w^e can supply ourselves with just now is, not the detailed 
program of policy, but the instrumentalities of gaining thor- 
ough knowledge of what we are about. Every man of us 
must for some time to come be "from Missouri!" We must 
want to know what the facts are, and when we know what 
the facts are we shall know what the policy ought to be. * * * 

* * * It has always been a fiction, — I don't know who in- 
vented it or why he invented it, — that there was a contest 
between the law and business. There has always been a 
contest in every government between the law and bad busi- 
ness, and I do not want to see that contest softened in any 
way; but there has never been any contest between men who 
intended the right thing and the men who administered the 
law. * * * 

You know that we have just now done what it was common 



i6o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

sense to do about the tariff. We have not put this into 
words, but I do not hesitate to put it into words: We have 
admitted that on the one side and on the other we v/ere 
talking theories and managing policies without a sufficient 
knowledge of the facts upon which we were acting, and, 
therefore, we have established v/hat is intended to be a non- 
partisan tariff commission to study the conditions with which 
legislation has to deal in the matter of the relations of Amer- 
ican with foreign business transactions. Another eye created 
to see the facts! And I am hopeful that I caji find the men 
who will see the facts and state them, no matter whose 
opinion those facts contradict. For an opinion ought always 
to have a profound respect for a fact; and when you once 
get the facts, opinions that are antagonistic to those facts 
are necessarily defeated. I have never found a really cour- 
ageous man who was afraid to put his opinion to the test 
of facts, or a morally sincere man who vms not ready to sur- 
render to the facts when they were contrary to his opinion. 
The Tariff Commission is going to look for the facts no 
matter who is hurt. We are creating one after another the 
instrumentalities of knowledge, so that the business men of 
this country shall know what the field of the world's business 
is and deal with that field upon that knowledge. 

Then, when the knowledge is obtained, what are we going 
to do? One of the things that interests me most about an 
association of this sort is that the intention of it is that the 
members should share a common body of information, and 
that they should concert among themselves those operations 
of business which are beneficial to all of them; that, instead 
of a large num.ber of dealers in grain acting separately and 
each fighting for his own hand, you are willing to come to- 
gether and study the problem as if you were partners and 
brothers and co-operators in this field of business. That has 
been going on in every occupation in the United States of 
any consequence. Even the men that do the advertising have 
been getting together, and they have made this startling and 
fundamental discovery, that the only way to advertise suc- 
cessfully is to tell the truth. There are n^any reasons for 
that. One of the chief reasons is that when you get found 
out, it is worse for you than it was before; but the great 



Sept. 25] WORLD BUSINESS OF AMERICA 161 

reason, the sober reason, is that business must be founded on 
the truth, and you men get together in order to create a 
clearing house for the truth about your business. 

Very well ; that is a picture in small of what we must do in 
the large. We must cooperate in the whole field of busi- 
ness, the Government with the merchant, the merchant with 
his employee, the whole body of producers with the whole 
body of consumers, to see that the right things are produced 
in the right volume and find the right purchasers at the right 
place, and that, all working together, we realize that nothing 
can be for the individual benefit which is not for the common 
benefit. =^ * =5= 

And it is absolutely necessary now to make good our new 
connections. Our new connections are with the great and 
rich Republics to the south of us. For the first time in miy 
recollection they are beginning to trust and believe in us and 
want us, and one of my chief concerns has been to see that 
nothing was done that did not show friendship and good faith 
on our part. You know that it used to be the case that if 
you wanted to travel comfortably in your own person from 
New York to a South American port, you had to go by way 
of England or else stow yourself away in some uncomfortable 
fashion in a ship that took almost as long to go straight, and 
within v/hose bowels you got in such a temper before you got 
there that you did not care v/hether she got there or not. The 
great interesting geographical fact to me is that by the open- 
ing of the Panama Canal there is a straight line south from 
New York through the canal to the western coast of South 
America, which hitherto has been one of the most remote 
coasts in the world so far as we are concerned. The west 
coast of South America is now nearer to us than the eastern 
coast of South America ever was, though we have the open 
Atlantic upon which to approach the east coast. Here is the 
loom all ready upon which to spread the threads which can 
be worked into a fabric of friendship and wealth such as we 
have never known before! 

The real wealth of foreign relationships, my fellow-citizens, 
whether they be the relationships of trade or any other kind 
of intercourse, the real wealth of those relationships is the 
wealth of mutual confidence and understanding. If we do not 



1 62 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

understand them and they do not understand us, we can not 
trade with them, much less be their friends, and it is only by 
weaving these intimate threads of connection that we shall 
be able to establish that fundamental thing, that psychologi- 
cal, spiritual nexus which is, after all, the real warp and woof 
of trade itself. We have got to have the knowledge, we have 
got to have the cooperation, and then back of all that has 
got to lie what America has in abundance and only has to 
release, that is to say, the self-reliant enterprise. 

There is only one thing I have ever been ashamed of about 
in America, and that was the timidity atnd fearfulness of 
Americans in the presence of foreign competitors. I have 
dwelt among Americans all my life and am an intense ab- 
sorbent of the atmosphere of America, and I know by per- 
sonal experience that there are as effective brains in America 
as anywhere in the world. An American afraid to pit Amer- 
ican business men against any competitors anywhere! En- 
terprise, the shrewdness which Americans have shown, the 
knowledge of business which they have shown, all these things 
are going to make for that peaceful and honorable conquest 
of foreign markets which is our reasonable ambition. * * * 

White House Pamphlet. 



48. A SOCIETY OF NATIONS 

(October 26, 19 16) 

Address at Cincinnati 

* * * What I intend to preach from this time on is that 
America must show that as a member of the family of na- 
tions she has the same attitude toward the other nations that 
she wishes her people to have toward each other: That 
America is going to take this position, that she will lend her 
moral influence, not only, but her physical force, if other 
nations will join her, to see to it that no nation and no group 
of nations tries to take advantage of another nation or group 
of nations, and that the only thing ever fought for is the 
common rights of humanity. 



:J 



Oct. 26] A SOCIETY OF NATIONS 163 

A great many men are complaining that we are not fight- ! 
ing now in order to get something — not something spiritual, 
not a right, not something, we could be proud of, but some- j 
thing we could possess and take advantage of and trade on j 
and profit by. They are complaining that the Government I 
of the United States has not the spirit of other Governments, 
which is to put the force, the army and navy, of that Gov- 
ernment behind investments in foreign countries. Just so 
certainly as you do that, you join this chaos of competing | 
and hostile ambitions. I 

Have you ever heard what started the present war? If/ j 
you have, I wish you would publish it, because nobody elsej i 
has, so far as I can gather. Nothing in particular started it,\ ] 
but everything in general. There had been growing up in ; 
Europe a mutual suspicion, an interchange of conjectures 
about what this Government and that Government was going ] 
to do, an interlacing of alliances and understandings, a com- | 
plex web of intrigue and spying, that presently was sure to 
entangle the whole of the family of mankind on that side of 
the water in its meshes. 

Now, revive that after this war is over and sooner or later 
you will have just such another w^ar, and this is the last war 
of the kind or of any kind that involves the world that the '' 
United States can keep out of. 

I say that because I believe that the business of neutrality '< 
is over; not because I want it to be over, but I mean this, 
that war now has such a scale that the position of neutrals 
sooner or later becomes intolerable. Just as neutrality v/ould ! 
be intolerable to me if I lived in a community where every- ; 
body had to assert his ow^n rights by force and I had to go 
around among my neighbors and say: "Here, this cannot last 
any longer; let us get together and see that nobody disturbs 
the peace any more." That is w^hat society is and we have ; 
not yet a society of nations. 

We must have a society of nations, not suddenly, not by 
insistence, not by any hostile emphasis upon the demand, but i 
by the demonstration of the needs of the time. The nations 1 
of the world must get together and say, "Nobody can here- ] 
after be neutral as respects the disturbance of the world's} ; 
peace for an object which the world's opinion can not sane- \ '> 



1 64 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 6 

tion." The world's peace ought to be disturbed if the fun- 
damental rights of humanity are invaded, but it ought not to 
be disturbed for any other thing that I can think of, and 
America was established in order to indicate, at any rate in 
one Government, the fundamental rights of man. America 
must hereafter be ready as a member of the family of na- 
tions to exert her whole force, moral and physical, to the 
assertion of those rights throughout the round globe. * * * 
New York Times, Oct. 27, 19 16. 



49. THE END OF ISOLATION 

(November 4, 19 16) 
Address at Shadov^^ Lav^tn 

* * * The world will never be again what it has been. 
The United States will never be again what it has been. The 
United States was once in enjoyment of what we used to call 
splendid isolation. The three thousand miles of the Atlan- 
tic seemed to hold all European affairs at arm's length from 
us. The great spaces of the Pacific seemed to disclose no 
threat of influence upon our politics. 

Now, from across the Atlantic and from across the Pacific 
we feel to the quick the influences v/hich are affecting our- 
selves, and, in die meantime, whereas we used to be always 
in search of assistance and stimulation from out of other 
countries, always in search of the capital of other countries 
to assist our investments, depending u|X)n foreign markets 
for the sale of our securities, now we have bought in more 
than 50 per cent of those securities; we have become not 
the debtors but the creditors of the world, and in what other 
nations used to play in promoting industries vrhich extended 
as wide as the world itself, we are playing the guiding part. 

We can determine to a large extent who is to be financed 
and who is not to be financed. That is the reason I say that 
the United States will never be again what it has been. So 
it does not suffice to look, as some gentlemen are looldng, 
back over their shoulders, to suggest that we do again what 



Nov. 4] THE END OF ISOLATION 165 

we did when we were provincial and isolated and uncon- 
nected with the great forces of the w^orld, for now we are in 
the great drift of humanity which is to determine the poli- 
tics of every country in the w^orld. 

With this outlook, is it worth while to stop to think of 
party advantage? Is it worth stopping to think of how we 
have voted in the past? We are now going to vote, if we 
be men with eyes open that can see the world, as those who 
wish to make a new America in a new world mean the same 
old thing for mankind that it meant when this great Repub- 
lic was set up; mean hope and justice and righteous judgment 
and unselfish action. Why, my fellow-citizens, it is an un- 
precedented thing in the world that any nation in determining 
its foreign relations should be unselfish, and my ambition is 
to see America set the great example ; not only a great ex- 
ample morally, but a great example intellectually. * * * ' 

Every man who has read and studied the great annals of 
this country may feel h;s blood warm as he feels these great 
forces of humanity growing stronger and stronger, not only, 
but knowing better and better from decade to decade how to 
concert action and unite their strength. In the days to come 
men will no longer wonder how America is going to work 
out her destiny, for she will have proclaimed to them that her 
destiny is not divided from the destiny of the world ; that her 
purpose is justice and love of mankind. 

New York Times, Nov. 5, 19 16. 



50. THE RIGHT HAND TO LABOR 

(November 18, 19 16) 

Address to the American Federation of Labor at the 
White House 

I need not say that, coming to me as you do on such an 
errand, I am very deeply gratified and very greatly cheered. 
It would be impossible for me off-hand to say just what 
thoughts are stirred in me by what Mr. Gompers has said 
to me as your spokesman, but perhaps the simplest thing I 



i66 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

can say is, after all, the meat of the whole matter. What I 
have tried to do is to get rid of any class division in this 
country, not only, but of any class consciousness and feeling. 
The worst thing that could happen to America would be that 
she should be divided into groups and camps in which there 
were men and women who thought that they were, at odds 
with one another, that the spirit of America was not ex- 
pressed except in them, and that possibilities of antagonism 
were the only things that we had to look forward to. 

As Mr. Gompers said, achievement is a comparatively 
small matter, but the spirit in which things are done is of the 
essence of the whole thing, and what I am striving for, and 
what I hope you are striving for, is to blot out all the lines 
of division in America, and create a unity of spirit and of 
purpose founded upon this, the consciousness that we are all 
men and women of the same sort, and that if we do not un- 
derstand each other we are not true Americans. If we 
cannot enter into each other's thoughts, if we cannot com- 
prehend each other's interests, if we cannot ser\'e each oth- 
er's essential welfare, then we have not yet qualified as repre- 
sentatives of the American spirit. 

Nothing alarms America so much as rifts, divisions, the 
drifting apart of elements among her people, and the thing 
we ought all to strive for is to close up every rift; and the 
only way to do it, so far as I can see, is to establish justice 
not only, but justice with a heart in it, justice with a pulse 
in it, justice with sympathy in it. Justice can be cold and 
forbidding, or can be warm and w^elcome, and the latter is 
the only kind of justice that Americans ought to desire. I do 
not believe I am deceiving myself when I say that I think 
this spirit is growing in America. I pray God it may con- 
tinue to grow, and all I have to say is to exhort every one 
whom my voice reaches here or elsewhere to come into this 
common movement of humanity. 

New York Times, Nov. 19, 19 16. 



Dec. i8] THE WAY TO PEACE 167 

51. THE WAY TO PEACE 

(December 18, 19 16) 

Despatch Partly in Reply to German Proposition of 
Peace, through Secretary Lansing 

The President of the United States has instructed me to 
suggest to the [here is inserted a designation of the Gov- 
ernment addressed] a course of action with regard to the 
present war which he hopes that the * * * Government will 
take under consideration as suggested in the most friendly 
spirit, and as coming not only from a friend but also as 
coming from the representative of a neutral nation whose 
interests have been most seriously affected by the war and 
whose concern for its early conclusion arises out of a manifest 
necessity to determine how best to safeguard those interests 
if the war is to continue. 

The suggestion which I am instructed to make the Presi- 
dent has long had it in mind to offer. He is somewhat em- 
barrassed to offer it at this particular time because it may 
now seem to have been prompted by a desire to play a part 
in connection with the recent overtures of the Central Pow- 
ers. It has in fact been in no way suggested by them in 
its origin and the President would have delayed offering it 
until those overtures had been independently answered but 
for the fact that it also concerns the questions of peace and 
may best be considered in connection with other proposals 
which have the same end in view. The President can only 
beg that his suggestion be considered entirely on its own 
merits and as if it had been made in other circumstances. 

The President suggests that an early occasion be sought 
to call out from all the nations now at war such an avowal 
of their respective views as to the terms upon which the 
war might be concluded and the arrangements which would 
be deemed satisfactory as a guaranty against its renewal or 
the kindling of any similar conflict in the future as would 
make it possible frankly to compare them. He is indifferent 
as to the means taken to accomplish this. He would be 



i6S ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

happy himself to serve, or even to take the initiative in its 
accomplishment, in any way that might prove acceptable, 
but he has no desire to determine the method or the instru- 
mentality. One way will be as acceptable to him as another 
if only the great object he has in mind be attained. 

He takes the liberty of calling attention to the fact that 
the objects which the statesmen of the belligerents on both 
sides have in mind in this war are virtually the same, as 
stated in general terms to their own people and to the world. 
Each side desires to make the rights and privileges of weak 
peoples and small states as secure against aggression or 
denial in the future as the rights and privileges of the great 
and powerful states now at war. Each wishes itself to be 
made secure in the future, along with all other nations and 
peoples, against the recurrence of wars like this, and against 
aggression or selfish interference of any kind. Each would 
be jealous of the formation of any more rival leagues to 
preserve an uncertain balance of powxr amidst multiplying 
suspicions; but each is ready to consider the formation of 
a league of nations to insure peace and justice throughout 
the world. Before that final step can be taken, however, each 
deems it necessary first to settle the issues of the present war 
upon terms which will certainly safeguard the independence, 
the territorial integrity, and the political and commercial free- 
dom of the nations involved. 

In the measures to be taken to secure the future peace of 
the world the people and Government of the United States 
are as vitally and as directly interested as the Governments 
novv' at v/ar. Their interest, moreover, in the means to be 
adopted to relieve the smaller and weaker peoples of the 
world of the peril of wrong and violence is as quick and 
ardent as that of any other people or Government. They 
stand ready, and even eager, to coop.erate in the accomplish- 
ijient of these ends, when tlie war is over, with every influence 
• and resource at their command. But the war must first 
be concluded. The terms upon which it is to be concluded 
they are not at liberty to suggest; but the President does 
feel that it is his right and his duty to point out their inti- 
mate interest in its conclusion, lest it should presently be 
too late to accomplish the greater things which lie beyond 



Dec. i8] THE WAY TO PEACE 169 

its conclusion, lest the situation of neutral nations, now ex- 
ceedingly hard to endure, be rendered altogether intolerable, 
and lest, more than all, an injury be done civilization itself 
which can never be atoned for or repaired. 

The President therefore feels altogether justified in sug- 
gesting an immediate opportunity for a comparison of views 
as to the terms which must precede those ultimate arrange- 
ments for the peace of the world, w^hich all desire and in 
which the neutral nations as v/ell as those at war are ready 
to play their full responsible part. If the contest must 
continue to proceed toward undefined ends by slow attrition 
until the one group of belligerents or the other is exhausted, 
if millions after millions of human lives must continue to 
be offered up until on the one side or the other there are 
no more to offer, if resentments must be kindled that can 
never cool and despairs engendered from which there can 
be no recovery, hopes of peace and of the willing concert of 
free peoples will be rendered vain and idle. 

The life of the entire world has been profoundly affected. 
Every part of the great family of mankind has felt the 
burden and terror of this unprecedented contest of arms. 
No nation in the civilized world can be said in truth to 
stand outside its influence or to be safe against its disturb- 
ing effects. And yet the concrete objects for which it is 
being waged have never been definitively stated. 

The leaders of the several belligerents have, as has been 
said, stated those objects in general terms. But, stated in 
general terms, they seem the same on both sides. Never 
yet have the authoritative spokesm.en of either side avowed 
the precise objects which would, if attained, satisfy them 
and their people that the war had been fought out. The 
world has been left to conjecture what definitive results, 
what actual exchange of guaranties, what political or terri- 
torial changes or readjustments, w^hat stage of military suc- 
ces_s even, would bring the war to an end. 

It may be that peace is nearer than we know; that the 
terms which the belligerents on the one side and on the 
other would deem it necessary to insist upon are not so 
irreconciliable as some have feared; that an interchaniie of 
views would clear the way at least for conference and make 



170 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1916 

the permanent concord of the nations a hope of the imme- 
diate future, a concert of nations immediately practicable. 
The President is not proposing peace; he is not even 
offering mediation. He is merely proposing that soundings 
be taken in order that we may learn, the neutral nations 
with the belligerent, how near the haven of peace may be 
for which all mankind longs with an intense and increasing 
longing. He believes that the spirit in which he speaks 
and the objects which he seeks will be understood by all 
concerned, and he confidently hopes for a response which 
will bring a new light into the affairs of the world. 

Congressional Record, LIV, App. 36. 



YEAR 1917 

52. SUPPORT FOR THE RED CROSS 

(January 7, 19 17) 

Public Appeal as President of the Red Cross 

Another Winter closes around the great European struggle 
and, with the cold, there comes greater need among soldiers 
in the fighting line and in the hospitals, and still more among 
the women and children in ruined homes or in exile. This 
country, at peace, blessed with prosperity, can hardly imagine 
the needs, but it can help to meet them. 

Of great importance among the agencies which have ex- 
pressed our sympathy with suffering humanity among the 
belligerent nations has been the American Red Cross. This 
organization of our countrymen has brought relief to every 
nation in the great war. Its skilled workers have cared for ■ 
1 1 the wounded in every army, have gone forth through the des- 
I olate Siberian plains to bring help to thousands of prisoners, 
I have fought disease in pestilence-ridden Serbia, and have 
|i brought hope to countless non-combatants, women, and chil- 
dren. 

Wherever these Red Cross men and women go, they are 

carrying:; the message that Americans cannot rest without 

i| seeking to relieve such suffering. Organized, persistent work, 

I i like that conducted by our American Red Cross, requires a 

'! great deal of money. Since the beginning of the war, money 

llhas come to us from men and women in all walks of life. 

! We have received checks in five figures and pennies wrapped 

in smudged envelopes. WTiat we have done with the money 

is told in the accompanying statement. 

But now our funds are well-nigh exhausted. We find 

171 



172 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

ourselves at the point where activities must be seriously cur- 
tailed and we must turn away from the heart-breaking appeals 
brought by every European mail, unless by your contribu- 
tion you help us to continue. 

It is for you to decide whether the most prosperous nation 
in the world will allow its national relief organization to keep 
up its work or withdraw from a field where there exists the 
greatest need ever recorded in history. We leave the decision 
in your hands, confident of its outcome. 

N€w York Times, Jan. 8, 19 17. 



53. CONDITIONS OF PEACE 

(January 22, 19 17) 

Address to the Senate 

On the eighteenth of December last I addressed an identic 
note to the governments of the nations now at war request- 
ing them to state, more definitely than they had yet been 
stated by either group of belligerents, the terms upon which 
they would deem it possible to make peace. I spoke on be- 
half of humanity and of tlie rights of all neutral nations like 
our own, many of whose most vital interests the war puts in 
constant jeapardy. The Central Powers united in a reply 
which stated merely that they were ready to meet their an- 
tagonists in conference to discuss terms of peace. The En- 
tente Powers have replied much more definitely and have 
stated, in general terms, indeed, but with sufficient definite- 
ness to imply details, the arrangements, guarantees, and acts 
of reparation which they deem to be the indispensable con- 
ditions of a sp.tisfactory settlement. We are that much nearer 
a definite discussion of the peace which shall end the present 
war. We are that much nearer the discussion of the inter- 
national concert which must thereafter hold the world at 
peace. In every discussion of the peace that must end this 
war it is taken for granted that that peace must be followed 
by some definite concert of power which will make it virtually 
impossible that any such catastrophe should ever overwhelm 



Jan. 22] CONDITIONS OF PEACE 173 

us again. Every lover of mankind, every sane and thought- 
ful man must take that for granted. 

I have sought this opportunity to address you because I 
thought that I owed it to you, as the council associated with 
me in the fmal determination of our international obliga- 
tions, to disclose to you without reserve the thought and 
purpose that have been taking form in my mind in regard 
to the duty of our Government in the days to come when it 
will be necessary to lay afresh and upon a new plan the 
foundations of peace among the nations. 

It is inconceivable that the people of the United States 
should play no part in that great enterprise. To take part in 
such a service will be the opportunity for which they have 
sought, to prepare themselves by the very principles and pur- 
poses of their polity and the approved practices of their 
Government ever since the days when they set up a new 
nation in the high and honorable hope that it might in all 
that it was and did show mankind the way to liberty. They 
cannot in honor withhold the service to which they are now 
about to be challenged. They do not wish to withhold it. 
But they owe it to themselves and to the other nations of the 
world to state the conditions under which they will feel free 
to render it. 

That service is nothing less than this, to add their authority 
and their power to the authority and force of other nations 
to guarantee peace and justice throughout the world. Such 
a settlement cannot now be long postponed. It is right that 
before it comes this Government should frankly formulate 
the conditions upon which it would feel justified in asking 
our people to approve its formal and solemn adherence to a 
League for Peace. I am here to attempt to state those con- 
ditions. 

The present war must first be ended; but we owe it to 
candour and to a just regard for the opinion of mankind to 
say that, so far as our participation in guarantees of future 
peace is considered, it makes a great deal of difference in 
what way and upon what terms it is ended. The treaties and 
agreements which bring it to an end must embody terms 
which will create a peace that is worth guaranteeing and 
preserving, a peace that will win the approval of mankind, 



174 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

not merely a peace that will sen-e the several interests and 
immediate aims of the nations engaged. We shall have no 
voice in determining what those terms shall be, but we shall, 
I feel sure, have a voice in determining whether they shall 
be made lasting or not by the guarantees of a universal cove- 
nant; and our judgment upon what is fundamental and es- 
sential as a condition precedent to permanency should be 
spoken now, not afterwards when it may be too late. 

No covenant of cooperative peace that does not include 
the peoples of the New World can suffice to keep the future 
safe against war; and yet there is only one sort of peace that 
the peoples of America could join in guaranteeing. The 
elements of that peace must be elements that engage the 
confidence and satisfy the principles of the American gov- 
ernments, elements consistent with their political faith and 
with the practical convictions which the peoples of America 
have once for all embraced and undertaken to defend. 

I do not mean to say that any American government would 
throw any obstacle in the way of any terms of peace the 
governments now at war might agree upon, or seek to upset 
them when made, whatever they might be. I only take it 
for granted that mere terms of peace between the belligerents 
vnll not satisfy even the belligerents themselves. Mere agree- 
ments may not make peace secure. It will be absolutely 
necessary that a force be created as a guarantor of the per- 
manency of the settlement so much greater than the force of 
any nation now engaged or any alliance hitherto formed or 
projected that no nation, no probable combination of na- 
tions could face or withstand it. If the peace presently to be 
made is to endure, it must be a peace m,ade secure by the 
organized major force of mankind. 

The terms of the immediate peace agreed upon will deter- 
mine whether it is a peace for which such a guarantee can 
be secured. The question upon which the whole future peace 
and policy of the world depends is this: Is the present war a 
struggle for a just and secure peace, or only for a new balance 
of power? If it be only a struggle for a new balance of 
power, who will guarantee, who can guarantee, the stable 
equilibrium of the new arrangement? Only a tranquil Europe 



Jan. 22] CONDITIONS OF PEACE 175 

can be a stable Europe. There must be, not a balance of 
power, but a comniiirity of power; not organized rivalries, 
but an organized common peace. 

Fortunately we have received very explicit assurances on 
this point. The statesmen of both of the groups of nations 
now arrayed against one another have said, in terms that 
could not be misinterpreted, that it was no part of the pur- 
pose they had in mind to crush their antagonist?. But the 
implications of these assurances may not be equally clear to 
all, — may not be the same on both sides of the water. I 
think it will be serviceable if I attempt to set forth what 
we understand them to be. 

They imply, first of all, that it_must be a peace without 
victory^ It is not pleasant to say this. I beg that I may be 
pefmifted to put my own interpretation upon it and that it 
may be understood that no other interpretation was in my 
thought. I am seeking only to face realities and to face them 
without soft concealments. Victory would mean peace forced 
upon the loser, a victor's terms imposed upon the van- 
quished. It would be accepted in humiliation, under duress, 
at an intolerable sacrifice, and would leave a sting, a resent- 
ment, a bitter memory upon which terms of peace would rest, 
not permanently, but only as upon quicksand. .Only a peace 
between equals can last. Only a peace the very principle of 
which is equality and a common participation in a common 
benefit. The right state of mind, the right feeling between 
nations, is as necessary for a lasting peace as is the just 
settlement of vexed questions of territory or of racial and 
national allegiance. 

The equality of nations upon which peace must be founded 
if it is to last must be an equality of rights; the guarantees 
exchanged must neither recognize nor imply a difference 
between big nations and small, between those that are pow- 
erful and those that are weak. Right must be based upon 
the common strength, not upon the individual strength, of 
the nations upon whose concert peace will depend. Equality 
of territory or of resources there of course cannot be; nor 
any other sort of equality not gained in the ordinary peace- 
ful and legitimate development of the peoples themselves. 



176 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

But no one asks or expects anything more than an equality 
of rights. Mankind is looking now for freedom of life, not 
for equipoises of power. 

And there is a deeper thing involved than even equality 
of right among organized nations. No peace can last, or 
ought to last, which does not recognize and accept the prin- 
ciple that governments derjve all their just powers from the 
consent of the governed, and that no right anywhere exists 
to hand peoples about from sovereignty to sovereignty as if 
they were property. I take it for granted, for instance, if I 
may venture upon a single example, that statesmen every- 
where are agreed that there should be a united, independent, 
and autonomous Poland, and that henceforth inviolable secur- 
ity of life, of worship, and of industrial and social develop- 
ment should be guaranteed to all peoples who have lived 
hitherto under the power of governments devoted to a faith 
and purpose hostile to their own. 

I speak of this, not because of any desire to exalt an 
abstract political principle which has always been held very 
dear by those who have sought to build up liberty in Amer- 
ica, but for the same reason that I have spoken of the other 
conditions of peace which seem to me clearly indispensable, — 
because I wish frankly to uncover realities. Any peace which 
does not recognize and accept this principle will ine\'itably 
be upset. It will not rest upon the affections or the con- 
victions of mankind. The ferment of spirit of whole popu- 
lations v/ill fight subtly and constantly against it, and all 
the world will sympathize. The world can be at peace only 
if its life is stable, and there can be no stability where the 
v/ill is in rebellion, where there is not tranquility of spirit 
and a sense of justice, of freedom, and of right. 

So far as practicable, moreover, every great people now 
struggling towards a full development of its resources and 
of its powers should be assured a direct outlet to the great 
hiirhways of the sea. Where this cannot be done by the cession 
of territory, it can no doubt be done by the neutralization 
of direct rights of way under the general guarantee which 
will assure the peace itself. With a right comity of arrange- 
ment no nation need be shut away from free access to the 
open paths of the world's commerce. 



Jan. 2 2 ] CONDITIONS OF PEACE 1 7 7 

And the paths of the sea must alike in law and in fact be 
free. The freedom of the seas is the sine qua non of peace, 
equality, and cooperation. No doubt a somewhat radical 
reconsideration of many of the rules of international prac- 
tice hitherto thought to be established may be necessary in 
order to make the seas indeed free and common in practically 
all circumstances for the use of mankind, but the motive for 
such changes is convincing and compelling. There can be 
no trust or intimacy between the peoples of the world without 
them. The free, constant, unthreatened intercourse of na- 
tions is an essential part of the process of peace and of 
development. It need not be difficult either to define or to 
secure the freedom of the seas if the governments of the 
world sincerely desire to come to an agreement concerning 
it. 

It is a problem closely connected with the limitation of 
naval armaments and the cooperation of the navies of the 
world in keeping the seas at once free and safe. And the 
question of limiting naval armaments opens the wider and 
perhaps more difficult question of the limitation of armies 
and of all programmes of military preparation. Difficult and 
delicate as these questions are, tiiey must be faced with the 
utmost candour and decided in a spirit of real accommodation 
if peace is to come with healing in its wings, and come to 
,stay. Peace cannot be had without concession and sacrifice. 
There can be no sense of safety and equality among the na- 
tions if great preponderating armaments are henceforth to 
continue here and there to be built up and maintained. The 
statesmen of the world must plan for peace and nations must 
adjust and accommodate their policy to it as they have 
planned for war and made ready for pitiless contest and 
rivalry. The question of armaments, whether on land or sea, 
is the most immediately and intensely practical question con- 
nected with the future fortunes of nations and of mankind. 

I have spoken upon these great matters without reserve and 
with the utmost explicitness because it has seemed to me to 
be necessary if the world's yearning desire for peace was 
anywhere to find free voice and utterance. Perhaps I am the 
only person in high authority amongst all the peoples of the 



178 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

world who is at liberty to speak and hold nothing back. I 
am speaking as an individual, and yet I am speaking also, 
of course, as the responsible head of a great government, and 
I feel confident that I have said what the people of the 
United States would wish me to say. May I not add that 
I hope and believe that I am in effect speaking for liberals 
and friends of humanity in every nation and of every pro- 
gramme of liberty? I would fain believe that I am speaking 
for the silent mass of mankind everywhere who have as yet 
had no place or opportunity to speak their real hearts out 
concerning the death and ruin they see to have come already 
upon the persons and the homes they hold most dear. 

And in holding out the expectation that the people and 
Government of the United States will join the other civilized 
nations of the world in guaranteeing the permanence of 
peace upon such terms as I have named I speak mth the 
greater boldness and confidence because it is clear to every 
man who can think that there is in this promise no breach 
in either our traditions or our policy as a nation, but a ful- 
filment, rather, of all that we have professed or striven for. 

I am proposing, as it were, that the nations should with 
one accord adopt the doctrine of President Monroe as the 
doctrine of the world: that no nation should seek to extend 
its polity over any other nation or people, but that every 
people should be left free to determine its own polity, its 
own way of development, unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, 
the little along with the great and powerful. 

I am proposing that all nations henceforth avoid entangling 
alliances which would draw them into competitions of 
power, catch them in a net of intrigue and selfish rivalry, 
and disturb their own affairs with influences intruded from 
without. There is no entangling alliance in a concert of 
power. When all unite to act in the sam.e sense and with 
the same purpose all act in the common interest and are 
free to live their own lives under a common protection. 

I am proposing government by the consent of the governed ; 
that freedom of the seas which in international conference 
after conference representatives of the United States have 
urged with the eloquence of those who are the convinced 
disciples of liberty; and that moderation of armament? 



Jan. 22] CONDITIONS OF PEACE 179 

which makes of armies and navies a power for order merely, 
not an instrument of aggression or of selfish violence. 

These are American principles, American policies. We 
could stand for no others. And they are also the prin- 
ciples and policies of forward looking men and women 
everywhere, of every modem nation, of every enlightened 
community. They are the principles of mankind and must 
prevail. White House Pamphlet. 

54. BREACH WITH GERMANY 

(February 3, 191 7) 
Address to Congress 

The Imperial German Government on the thirty-first of 
January announced to this Government and to the govern- 
ments of the other neutral nations that on and after the 
first day of February, the present month, it would adopt a 
policy with regard to the use of submarines against all 
shipping seeking to pass through certain designated areas of 
the high seas to which it is clearly my duty to call your 
attention. 

Let me remind the Congress that on the eighteenth of 
April last, in view of the sinking on the twenty- fourth of 
March of the cross-channel passenger steamer Sussex by a 
German submarine, without summons or warning, and the 
consequent loss of the lives of several citizens of the United 
States Avho were passengers aboard her, this Government 
addressed a note to the Imperial German Government in 
which it made the following declaration: 

*Tf it is still the purpose of the Imperial Government to 
prosecute relentless and indiscriminate warfare against ves- 
sels of commerce by the use of submarines without regard 
to what the Government of the United States must con- 
sider the sacred and indisputable rules of international law 
and the universally recognized dictates of humanity, the 
Government of the United States is at last forced to the 
conclusion that there is but one course it can pursue. Un- 
less the Imperial Government should now immediately de- 



i8o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 7 

dare and effect an abandonment of its present methods of 
submarine warfare against passenger and freight-carrying 
vessels, the Government of the United States can have no 
choice but to sever diplomatic relations with the German 
Empire altogether." 

In reply to this declaration the Imperial German Govern- 
ment gave this Government the following assurance: 

'The German Government is prepared to do its utmost to 
confine the operations of war for the rest of its duration to 
the fighting forces of the belligerents, thereby also insuring 
the freedom of the seas, a principle upon which the German 
Government believes, now as -before, to be in agreement with 
the Government of the United States. 

''The German Government, guided by this idea, notifies 
the Government of the United States that the German 
naval forces have received the following orders: In accord- 
ance with the general principles of visit and search and de- 
struction of merchant vessels recognized by international 
law, such vessels, both within and \^ithout the area declared 
as nav?J war zone, shall not be sunk \vithout warning and 
without saving human lives, unless these ships attempt to 
escape or offer resistance. 

"But," it added, "neutrals can not expect that Germany, 
forced to fight for her existence, shall, for the sake of neutral 
interest, restrict the use of an effective weapon if her enemy 
is permitted to continue to apply at will methods of war- 
fare violating the rules of international law. Such a demand 
would be incompatible with the character of neutrality, and 
the German Government is convinced that the Government 
of the United States does not think of m.aking such a de- 
mand, knoT\ing that the Government of the United States 
has ref)eatedly declared that it is determined to restore the 
principle of the freedom of the seas, from whatever quarter 
it has been violated." 

To this the Government of the United States replied on 
the eighth of May, accepting, of course, the assurances given, 
but adding, 

"The Government of the Uni^^^ed States feels it necessary 
to state that it takes it for granted that the Imperial German 
Government does not intend to imply that the maintenance 



Feb. 3] BREACH WITH GERMANY tS 

of its newly announced policy is in any way contingent upon 
the course or result of diplomatic negotiations between the 
Government of the United States and any other belligerent 
Government, notwithstanding the fact that certain passages 
in the Imperial Government's note of the 4th instant might 
appear to be susceptible of that construction. In order, 
however, to avoid any possible misunderstanding, the Gov- 
ernment of the United States notifies the Imperial Govern- 
ment that it can not for a moment entertain, much less 
discuss, a suggestion that respect by Germ.an naval authori- 
ties for the rights of citizens of the United States upon the 
high seas should in any way or in the slightest degree be 
made contingent upon the conduct of any other Govern- 
ment affecting the rights of neutrals and noncom.batants. 
Responsibility in such matters is single, not joint; absolute, 
not relative." 

To this note of the eighth of May the Imperial German 
Government made no reply. 

On the thirty-first of January, the Wednesday of the pres- 
ent week, the German Ambassador handed to the Secretary 
of State, along \\ith a formal note, a memiorandum which 
contains the following statement: 

"The Imperial Government, therefore, does not doubt that 
the Government of the United States will understand the 
situation thus forced upon Germany by the Entente-Allies' 
brutal methods of war and by their determination to destroy 
the Central Powers, and that the Government of the United 
States will further realize that the now openly disclosed 
intentions of the Entente-Allies give back to Germany the 
freedom of action which she reserved in her note addressed 
to the Government of the United States on May 4, 19 16. 

"Under these circumstances Germany w^ll meet the illegal 
measures of her enemies by forcibly preventing after Feb- 
ruary I, 191 7, in a zone around Great Britain, France, 
Italy, and in the Eastern Jvlediterranean all navigation, that 
of neutrals included, from and to England and from and to 
France, etc., etc. All ships met within the zone will be 
sunk." 

I think that you will agree with me that, in view of this 
declaration, which suddenly and without prior intimation of 



i82 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

any kind deliberately v/ithdraws the solemn assurance given 
in the Imperial Government's note of the fourth of May, 
19 1 6, this Government has no alternative consistent with 
the dignity and honor of the United States but to take the 
course which, in its note of the eighteenth of April, 10 16, it 
announced that it would take in the event that the Gernmn 
Government did not declare and effect an abandonment of 
the methods of submarine warfare which it v/as then em- 
ploying and to which it now purposes again to resort. 

I have, therefore, directed the Secretary of State to an- 
nounce to His Excellency the German Ambassador that all 
diplomatic relations between the United States and the 
German Empire are severed, and that the American Ambas- 
sador at Berlin will immediately be withdrawn; and, in 
accordance with this decision, to hand to His Excellency his 
passports. 

Notwithstanding this unexpected action of the German 
Government, this sudden and deeply deplorable renunciation 
of its assurances, given this Government at one of the most 
critical moments of tension in tire relations of the two govern- 
ments, I refuse to believe that it is the intention of the 
German authorities to do in fact what they have warned 
us they will feel at liberty to do. I can not bring myself to 
believe that they will indeed pay no regard to the ancient 
friendship between their people and our own or to the 
solemn obligations which have been exchanged between them 
and destroy American ships and take the lives of American 
citizens in the wilful prosecution of the ruthless naval pro- 
gramme they have announced their intention to adopt. Only 
actual overt acts on their part can make me believe it even 
now. 

If this inveterate confidence on my part in the sobriety 
and prudent foresight of their purpose should unhappily 
prove unfounded; if American ships and American lives 
should in fact be sacrificed by their naval commanders in 
heedless contravention of the just and reasonable under- 
standings of international law and the obvious dictates of 
humanity, I shall take the liberty of coming again before 
the Congress, to ask that authority be given me to use any 
means that may be necessary for the protection of our sea- 



Feb. 3] BREACH WITH GERMANY 183 

men and our people in the prosecution of their peaceful 
and legitimate errands on the high seas. I can do nothing , 
less. I take it for granted that all neutral governments will j 
take the same course. i 

We do not desire any hostile conflict with the Imperial 
German Government. We are the sincere friends of the 
German people and earnestly desire to remain at peace with 
the Government which speaks for them. We shall not be- 
lieve that they are hostile to us unless and until we are 
obliged to believe it; and we purpose nothing more than 
the reasonable defense of the undoubted rights of our people. 
We wish to serve no selfish ends. We ?eek merely to stand 
true alike in thought and in action to the immemorial prin- 
ciples of our people which I sought to express in my address 
to the Senate only two weeks ago, — seek merely to vindi- 
cate our right to liberty and justice and an unmolested life. 
These are the bases of peace, not war. God grant we may 
not be challenged to defend them by acts of wilful injustice 
on the part of the Government of Germany! 

White House Pamphlet. 

55. A GREAT INVENTOR 

(February 10, 19 17) 

Letter to Thomas A. Edison on His 70TH Birthday 

I wish with all my heart that I might be present to take 
part in celebrating Mr. Edison's seventieth birthday. It 
would be a real pleasure to be able to say in public with what 
deep and genuine admiration I have followed his remarkable 
career of achievement. I was an undergraduate at the 
university when his first inventions captured the imagination 
of the world, and ever since then I have retained the sense 
of magic which what he did then created in my mind. He 
seems always to have been in the special confidence of 
Nature herself. His career already has made an indelible 
impression in the history of applied science, and I hope that 
he has many years before him in which to make his record 
still more remarkable. 

New York Times, Feb. 11, 191 7. 



i84 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 
56. POLITICAL PRINCIPLES OF AMERICANS 

(March 5, 1917) 
Second Inaugural Address 

The four years which have elapsed since last I stood in 
this place have been crowded with counsel and action of the 
most vital interest and consequence. Perhaps no equal 
period in our history has been so fruitful of important re- 
forms in our economic and industrial life or so full of sig- 
nificant changes in the spirit and purpose of our political 
action. We have sought very thoughtfully to set our house 
in order, correct the grosser errors and abuses of our indus- 
trial life, liberate and quicken the processes of our national 
genius and energy, and lift our politics to a broader view 
of the people's essential interests. It is a record of singular 
variety and singular distinction. But I shall not attempt 
to review it. It speaks for itself and will be of increasing 
influence as the years go by. This is not the time for retro- 
spect. It is time, rather, to speak our thoughts and purposes 
concerning the present and the immediate future. 

Although we have centered counsel and action with such 
unusual concentration and success upon the great problems 
of domestic legislation to which we addressed ourselves four 
years ago, other matters have more and more forced them- 
selves upon our attention, matters lying outside our own 
life as a nation and over which we had no control, but which, 
despite our wish to keep free of them, have drawn us more 
and more irresistibly into their ovm current and influence. 

It has been impossible to avoid them. They have affected 
the life of the whole world. They have shaken men every- 
where Vv'ith a passion and an apprehension tliey never knew 
before. It has been hard to preserve calm counsel while the 
thought of our own people swayed this way and that under 
their influence. We are a composite and cosmopolitan peo- 
ple. We are of the blood of all the nations that are at war. 
The currents of our thoughts as well as the currents of our 
trade run quick at all seasons back and forth between us 
and them. The war inevitably set its mark from the first 



Mar. 5] AMERICAN POLITICAL PRINCIPLES 185 

alike upon our minds, our industries, our commerce, our 
politics, and our social action. To be indifferent to it or 
independent of it was out of the question. 

And yet all the while we have been conscious that we 
were not part of it. In that consciousness, despite many- 
divisions, we have drawn closer together. We have been 
deeply wronged upon the seas, but we have not wished to 
wrong or injure in return; have retained throughout the 
consciousness of standing in some sort apart, intent upon an 
interest that transcended the immediate issues of the war 
itself. As some of the injuries done us have become intol- 
erable we have still been clear that we wished nothing for 
ourselves that we were not ready to demand for all man- 
kind, — fair dealing, justice, the freedom to live and be at 
ease against organized wrong. 

It is in this spirit and v\^ith this thought that we have 
gro\Mi more and more aware, more and more certain that 
the part we wished to play was the part of those who mean 
to vindicate and fortify peace. We have been obliged to 
arm ourselves to make good our claim to a certain minimum 
of right and of freedom of action. We stand firm in armed 
neutrality since it seems that in no other way can we demon- 
strate what it is we insist upon and cannot forego. We may 
even be drawn on, by circumstances, not by our own purpose 
or desire, to a more active assertion of our rights as we see 
them and a more immediate association with the great 
struggle itself. But nothing will alter our thought or our 
purpose. They are too clear to be obscured. They are too 
deeply rooted in the principles of our national life to be 
altered. We desire neither conquest nor advantage. We 
wish nothing that can be had only at the cost of another 
people. We have ahvays professed unselfish purpose and we 
covet the opportunity to prove that our professions are 
sincere. 

There are many things still to do at home, to clarify our 
own politics and give new vitality to the industrial processes 
of our own life, and we shall do them as time and oppor- 
tunity serve; but w^e realize that the greatest things that 
remain to be done must be done with the whole world for 
stage and in cooperation with the wide and universal forces 



i86 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

of mankind, and we are making our spirits ready for those 
things. They will follow in the immediate wake of the war 
itself and will set civilization up again. We are provincials 
no longer. The tragical events of the thirty months of vital 
turmoil through which we have just passed have made us 
citizens of the world. There can be no turning back. Our 
own fortunes as a nation are involved, whether we would 
have it so or not. 

And yet we are not the less Americans on that account. 
We shall be the more American if we but remain true to the 
principles in which we have been bred. They are not the 
principles of a province or of a single continent. We have 
known and boasted all along that they were the principles 
of a liberated mankind. These, therefore, are the things we 
shall stand for, whether in war or in peace: 

That all nations are equally interested in the peace of the 
world and in the political stability of free peoples, and equally 
responsible for their maintenance; 

That the essential principle of peace is the actual equality 
of nations in all matters of right or privilege; 

That peace cannot securely or justly rest upon an armed 
balance of power; 

That governments derive all their just powers from the 
consent of the governed and that no other powers should 
be supported by the common thought, purpose, or power 
of the family of nations. 

That the seas should be equally free and safe for the use 
of all peoples, under rules set up by common agreement and 
consent, and that, so far as practicable, they should be 
accessible to all upon equal terms; 

That national armaments should be limited to the necessi- 
ties of national order and domestic safety; 

That the community of interest and of power upon which 
peace must henceforth depend imposes upon each nation the 
duty of seeing to it that all influences proceeding from its 
owTi citizens meant to encourasie or assist revolution in 
other states should be sternly and effectually suppressed and 
prevented. 

I need not argue these principles to you, my fellow coun- 
trymen: they are your own, part and peircel of your own 



Mar. 5] AMERICAN POLITICAL PRINCIPLES 187 

thinking and your own motive in affairs. They spring up 
native amongst us. Upon this as a platform of purpose 
and of action we can stand together. 

And it is imperative that we should stand together. We 
are being forged into a new unity amidst the fires that now 
blaze throughout the world. In their ardent heat we shall, 
in God's providence, let us hope, be purged of faction and 
division, purified of the errant humors of party cind of 
private interest, and shall stand forth in the days to come 
with a new dignity of national pride and spirit. Let each 
man see to it that the dedication is in his own heart, the 
high purpose of the Nation in his own mind, ruler of his 
own will and desire. 

I stand here and have taken the high and solemn oath to 
which you have been audience because the people of the 
United States have chosen me for this august delegation of 
power and have by their gracious judgment named me 
their leader in affairs. I know now what the task means. 
I realize to the full the responsibility which it involves. I 
pray God I may be given the wisdom and the prudence to do 
my duty in the true spirit of this great people. I am their 
servant and can succeed only as they sustain and guide me 
by their confidence and their counsel. The thing I shall 
count upon, the thing without which neither counsel nor 
action will avail, is the unity of America, — an America united 
in feeling, in purpose, and in its vision of duty, of oppor- 
tunity, and of service. We are to beware of all men who 
would turn the tasks and the necessities of the Nation to 
their outi private profit or use them for the building up of 
private power; beware that no faction or disloyal intrigue 
break the harmony or embarrass the spirit of our people; 
beware that our Government be kept pure and incorrupt in 
all its parts. United alike in the conception of our duty and 
in the high resolve to perform it in the face of all men, let 
us dedicate ourselves to the great task to which we must 
now set our hand. For myself I beg your tolerance, your 
countenance, and your united aid. The shadows that now 
lie dark upon our path will soon be dispelled and we shall 
walk with the light all about us if we be but true to our- 
selves, — to ourselves as we have wished to be known in the 



1 88 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

counsels of the world and in the thought of all those who 
love liberty and justice and the right exalted. 

White House Pamphlet. 



57. NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 

(April 2, 191 7) 

Address to Congress 

I have called the Congress into extraordinary session be- 
cause there are serious, very serious, choices of policy to be 
made, and made immediately, which it was neither right nor 
constitutionally permissible that I should assume the respon- 
sibility of making. 

On the third cf February last I cfncidly laid before you 
the extraordinary announcement of the Imperial German 
Governm.ent that on and after the first day of February it 
was its purpose to put aside all restraints of law or of 
humanity and use its submarines to sink every vessel that 
sought to approach either the ports of Great Britain and 
Ireland cr the western coasts of Europe cr any of the ports 
controlled by the enemies of Germany within the Mediter- 
ranean. That had seemed to be the object of the German 
submarine warfare earlier in the war, but since April of last 
year the Im.perial Government had somewhat restrained the 
commanders of its undersea craft in conformity vrith its 
promise then given to us that passenger boats should not be 
sunk and that due warning would be given to all other vessels 
which its submarines might seek to destroy, w^hen no resist- 
ance was offered or escape attempted, and care taken that 
their crews were given at least a fair chance to save their 
lives in their open boats. The precautions taken were 
meagre and haphazard enough, as was proved in distressing 
instance after instance in the progress of the cruel and 
unmanly business, but a certain degree of restraint was 
observed. The new policy has swept every restriction aside. 
Vessels of every kind, whatever their flag, their character, 
tjieir cargo, their destination, their errand, have been ruth- 



Apr. 2] NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 189 

lessly sent to the bottom without warning and without 
thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels 
of friendly neutrals along with those of belligerents. Even 
hospital ships and ships carrying relief to the sorely bereaved 
and stricken people of Belgium, though the latter were pro-i 
vided with safe conduct through the proscribed areas by the, 
German Government itself and were distinguished by un- 
mistakable marks of identity, have been sunk with the sameaj 
reckless lack of compassion or of principle. J 

I was for a little while unable to believe that such things 
would in fact be done by any government that had hitherto 
subscribed to the humane practices of civilized nations. 
International law had its origin in the attempt to set up 
some law which would be respected and observed upon the 
seas, vrhere no nation had right of dominion and where lay 
the free highways of the world. By painful stage after 
stage has that law been built up, with meagre enough results, 
indeed, after all was accomplished that could be accom- 
plished, but alvv-ays with a clear view, at least, of what the 
heart and conscience of mankind demanded. This minimum 
of right the German Government has swept aside under the 
plea of retaliation and necessity and because it had no 
weapons which it could use at sea except these which it is 
impossible to employ as it is employing them without throw- 
ing to the vrinds all scruples of humanity or of respect for 
tlie world. I am not now thinking of the loss of property 
involved, immense and serious as that is, but only of the 
wanton and wholesale destruction of the lives of non-com- 
batants, men, women, and children, engaged in pursuitkl 
which have always, even in the darkest periods of modern'" 
history, been deemed innocent and legitimate. Property can^ 
be paid for; the lives of peaceful and innocent people cannot 
be. The present German submarine warfare against com- 
merce is a warfare against mankind. 

It is a war against all nations. American ships have 
been sunk, American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred 
us very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of othe* 
neutral and friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed 
in the waters in the same way. There has been no dis- 
crimination. The challenge is to all mankind. Each nation 



190 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

must decide for itself how it will meet it. The choice we 
make for ourselves must be made with a moderation of 
counsel and a temperateness of judgment befitting our char- 
acter and our motives as a nation. We must put excited 
feeling away. Our motive will not be revenge or the vic- 
torious assertion of the physical might of the nation, but only 
the vindication of right, of human right, of which we are only 
a single champion. 

When I addressed the Congress on the twenty-sixth of 
February last I thought that it would suffice to assert our 
neutral rights with arms, our right to use the seas against 
unlawful interference, our right to keep our people safe 
against unlawful violence. But armed neutrality, it now 
appears, is impracticable. Because submarines are in effect 
outlaws when used as the German submarines have been used 
against merchant shipping, it is impossible to defend ships 
against their attacks as the laws of nations has assumed 
that merchantmen would defend themselves against priva- 
teers or cruisers, visible craft giving chase upon the open sea. 
It is common prudence in such circumstances, grim necessity 
indeed, to endeavor to destroy them before they have sho\Mi 
their own intention. They must be dealt with upon sight, 
if dealt with at all. The German Government denies the 
right of neutrals to use arms at all within the areas of the 
sea which it has proscribed, even in the defense of rights 
which no modern publicist has ever before questioned their 
right to defend. The intimation is conveyed that the armed 
guards which we have placed on our merchant ships will be 
treated as beyond the pale of law and subject to be dealt 
w^th as pirates would be. Armed neutrality is ineffectual 
enough at best; in such circumstances and in the face of 
such pretensions it is worse than ineffectual: it is likely only 
to produce what it was meant to prevent; it is practically 
certain to draw us into the war without either the rights 
or the effectiveness of belligerents. There is one choice we 
cannot make, we are incapable of makmg; we will not choose 
the path of submission and suffer the most sacred rights of 
our nation and our people to be ignored or violated. The 
wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common 
wrongs; they cut to the very roots of human life. 



Apr. 2] NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 191 

With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical 
character of the step I am taking and of the s^rave respon- 
sibilities which it involves, but in unhesitating obedience to 
what I deem my constitutional dut}-, I advise that the Con- 
gress declare the recent course of the Imperial German Gov- 
ernment to be in fact nothing less than war against the 
government and people of the United States; that it for- 
mally accept the status of belligerent which has thus been 
thrust upon it; and that it take immediate steps not only 
to put the country in a more thorough state of defense but 
also to exert all its power and employ all its resources to 
bring the Government of the German Empire to terms and 
end the war. 

What this will involve is clear. It will involve the utmost 
practicable cooperation in counsel and action with the gov- 
ernments now at war with Germany, and, as incident to 
that, the extension to those governments of the most liberal 
financial credits, in order that our resources may so far as 
possible be added to theirs. It will involve the organiza- 
tion and mobilization of all the material resources of the 
country to supply the materials of war and serve the inci- 
dental needs of the nation in the most abundant and yet 
the most economical and efficient way possible. It will in- 
volve the immediate full equipment of the navy in all respects 
but particularly in supplying it with the best means of deal- 
ing with tlie enemy's submarines. It will involve the imme- 
diate addition to the armed forces of the United States 
already provided for by law in case of war at least five 
hundred thousand men, who should, in my opinion, be chosen 
upon the principle of universal liability to service, and also 
the authorization of subsequent additional increments of 
equal force so soon as they may be needed and can be 
handled in training. It will involve also, of course, the 
granting of adequate credits to the Government, sustained, 
I hope, so far as they can equitably be sustained by the 
present generation, by well conceived taxation. 

I say sustained so far as may be equitable by taxation/ 
because it seems to me that it would be most unwise to 
base the credits which will now be necessary entirely oii 
money borrowed. It is our duty, I most respectfully urge,\ 



192 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 7 

to protect our people so far as we may against the very 
serious hardships and evils which would be likely to arise 
out of the inflation which would be produced by vast loans. 

In carrying out the measures by which these things are 
to be accomplished we should keep constantly in mind the 
wisdom of interfering as little as possible in our o-\vn prepa- 
ration and in the equipment of our own military forces with 
the duty, — for it will be a very practical duty, — of supply- 
ing the nations already at war with Germany with the ma- 
terials which they can obtain only from us or by our assist- 
ance. They are in the field and we should help them in 
every way to be effective there. 

I shall take the liberty of suggesting, through the several 
J I executive departments of the Govemm.ent, for the considera- 
!j tion of your committees, measures for the accomplishment 
|i of the several objects I have mentioned. I hope that it will 
\\he your pleasure to deal with them as having been framed 
1 1 after very careful thought by the branch of the Government 
jupon which the responsibility of conducting the war and 
/| safeguarding the nation will most directly fall. 

While we do these things, these deeply momentous tilings, 
let us be very clear, and make very clear to all the world 
what our motives and our objects are. My own thought 
has not been driven from its habitual and norm.al course by 
the unhappy events of the last two months, and I do not 
believe that the thought of the nation has been altered or 
clouded by them. I have exactly the same things in mind 
now that I had in mind when I addressed the Senate on the 
tvrenty-second of January last; the same that I had in mind 
when I addressed the Congress on the third of February and 
on the twenty-sixth of February. Our object now, as then, 
is to vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life 
of the world as against selfish and autocratic power and to 
set up amongst the really free and self-governed peoples of 
the world such a concert of purpose and of action as will 
henceforth ensure the observance of those principles. Neu- 

Itrality is no longer feasible or desirable where the peace of 
the world is involved and the freedom of its peoples, and the 
menace to that peace and freedom lies in the existence of 
autocratic governments backed by organized force which is 



Apr. 2] NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 193 

controlled wholly by their will, not by the -will of their f 
people. We have seen the last of neutrality in such circum- i 
stances. We are at the beginning of an age in which it will 
be insisted that the same standards of conduct and of re- 
sponsibility for wrong done shall be observed among nations 
and their governments that are observed among the individ- 
ual citizens of civilized states. 

We have no quarrel with the German people. We have 
no feeling towards them but one of sympathy and friend- 
ship. It was not upon their impulse that their government f 
acted in entering this war. It was not with their previous 
knowledge or approval. It v/as a war determined upon as 
wars used to be determined upon in the old, unhappy days 
when peoples were nowhere consulted by their rulers and \ 
wars were provoked and waged in the interest of d3masties ) 
or of little groups of ambitious men who v\"ere accustomed to ' 
use their fellow men as pawnis and tools. Self-governed • 
nations do not fill their neighbor states with spies or set the 
course of intrigue to bring about some critical posture of 
affairs which will give them an opportunity to strike and 
make conquest. Such designs can be successfully worked 
out only under cover and where no one has the right to ask 
questions. Cunningly contrived plans of deception or ag- 
gression, carried, it m,ay be, from generation to generation,. 
can be v/orked out and kept from the light only within 
the privacy of courts cr behind the carefully guarded con- 
fidences of a narrow and privileged class. They are happily 
impossible where public opinion commands and insists upon 
full information concerning all the nation's affairs. 

A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained ex- f 
cept by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic r 
government could be trusted to keep faith within it or observe! 
its covenants. It must be a league of honor, a partnership 
of opinion. Intrigue would eat its vitals away; the plottings 
of inner circles w^ho could plan what they would and render 
account to no one would be a corruption seated at its very 
heart. Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their 
honor steady to a common end and prefer the interests of 
■ mankind to any narrow interest of their owti. 

Does not every American feel that assurance has been 



194 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

added to our hope for the future peace of the world by the 
wonderful and heartening things that have been happening 
within the last few weeks in Russia? Russia was known by 
those w'-o knew it best to have been always in fact demo- 
cratic at heart, in all the vital habits of her thought, in all 
the intimate relationships of her people that spoke their 
natural instinct, their habitual attitude towards life. The 
autocracy that crowned the summit of her political structure, 
long as it had stood and terrible as was the reality of its 
power, was not in fact Russian in origin, character, or pur- 
pose; and now it has been shaken off and the great, gen- 
erous Russian people have been added in all their naive 
majesty and might to the forces that are fighting for freedom 
in the world, for justice, and for peace. Here is a fit partner 
for a League of Honor. 

One of the things that has served to convince us that the 
Prussian autocracy was not and could never be our friend is 
that from the very outset of the present war it has filled our 
unsuspecting communities and even our offices of govern- 
ment with spies and set criminal intrigues everyvvhere afoot 
against our national unity of counsel, our peace ^^^thin and 
■without, our industries and our commerce. Indeed it is now 
evident that its spies were here even' before the war began; 
and it is unhappily not a matter of conjecture but a fact 
proved in our courts of justice that the intrigues which have 
more than once come perilously near to disturbing the peace 
and dislocating the industries of the country have been car- 
ried on at the instigation, with the support, and even under 
the personal direction of official agents of the Imperial 
Government accredited to the Government of the United 
States. Even in checking these things and trying to extir- 
pate them we have sought to put the most generous inter- 
pretation possible upon them because we knew that their 
source lay, not in any hostile feeling or purpose of the Ger- 
man people towards us (who were, no doubt, as ignorant of 
them as we ourselves wTre), but only in the selfish designs 
of a Government that did what it pleased and told its people 
nothing. But they have played their part in serving to con- 
vince us at last that that Government entertains no real 
friendship for us and means to act against our peace and 



Apr. 2] NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 195 

security at its convenience. That it means to stir up enemies^ 
against us at our very doors the intercepted note to the ." 
German Minister at Mexico City is eloquent evidence. ' 

We are accepting this challenge of hostile purpose because 
we know that in such a government, following such methods, 
we can never have a friend; and that in the presence of its 
organized power, always lying in wait to accomplish we 
know not what purpose, there can be no assured security for 
the democratic governments of the world. We are now about 
to accept gauge of battle with this natural foe to liberty 
and shall, if necessary, spend the whole force of the nation 
to check and nullify its pretensions and its power. We are 
glad, now that we see the facts with no veil of false pre- 
tense about them, to fight thus for the ultimate peace of the 
world and for the liberation of its peoples, the German peo- 
ples included: for the rights of nations great and small and 
the privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life 
and of obedience. The world must be made safe for democ- 
j^cy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations 
of political liberty. We must have no selfish ends to serve. 
We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemni- 
ties for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices 
we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of 
the rights of mankind. We shall be satisfied when those 
rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom 
of nations can make them. 

Just because we fight without rancor and without selfish 
object, seeking nothing for ourselves but what we shall wish 
to share with all free peoples, we shall, I feel confident, con- 
duct our operations as belligerents without passion and our- 
selves observe with proud punctilio the principles of right 
and of fair play we profess to be fighting for. 

I have said nothing of the governments allied \vith the 
Imperial Government of Germany because they have not 
made war upon us or challenged us to defend our right and 
our honor. The Austro-Hungarian Government has, indeed, 
avowed its unqualified endorsement and acceptance of the 
reckless and lawless submarine warfare adopted now without 
disguise by the Imperial German Government, and it has 
therefore not been possible for this Government to receive 



196 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

Count Tarnowski, the Ambassador recently accredited to 
this Government by the Imperial and Royal Government of 
Austria-Hungary; but that Government has not actually 
engaged in warfare against citizens of the United States on 
the seas, and I take the liberty, for the present at least, of 
postponing a discussion of our relations with the authorities 
at Vienna. We enter this war only where we are clearly 
forced into it because there are no other means of defending 
our rights. 

It vdW be all the easier for us to conduct ourselves as 
belligerents in a high spirit of right and fairness because we 
act without animus, not in enmity towards a people or with 
the desire to bring any injury or disadvantage upon them, 
but only in armed opposition to an irresponsible government 
which has thrown aside all considerations of humanity and 
of right and is running amuck. We are, let me say again, 
the sincere friends of the German people, and shall desire 
nothing so much as the early reestablish men t of intimate 
relations of mutual advantage between us, — however hard 
it may be for them, for the time being, to believe that this 
is spoken from our hearts. We have borne with their present 
government through all these bitter months because of that 
friendship, — exercising a patience and forbearance which 
would othervvise have been impossible. We shall, happily, 
still have an opportunity to prove that friendship in our 
daily attitude and actions towards the millions of men and 
women of German birth and native sympathy who live 
amongst us and share our life, and we shall be proud to 
prove it towards all who are in fact loyal to their neighbors 
and to the Government in the hour of test. They are, most 
of them, as true and loyal Americans as if they had never 
knowTi any other fealty or allegiance. They will be prompt 
to stand vrith us in rebuking and restraining the few who 
may be of a different mind and purpose. If there should be 
disloyalty, it will be dealt with with a firm hand of stern 
repression; but, if it lifts its head at all, it will lift it only 
here and there and without countenance except from a law- 
less and malignant few. 

It is a distressing and oppressive duty. Gentlemen of the 
Congress, which I have performed in thus addressing you. 



Apr. 2] NECESSITY OF WAR AGAINST GERMANY 197 

There are, it may be, many months of fiery trial and sacri- 
fice ahead of us. It is a fearful thing to lead this great 
peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disas- 
trous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the 
balance: But the right is more precious than peace, and we 
shall fight for the things which we have always carried 
nearest our hearts, — for democracy, for the right of those 
who submit to authority to have a voice in their own. govern- 
ments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a 
universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples 
as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the 
world itself at last free. To such a task we can dedicate 
our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and every- 
thing that w^e have, with the pride of those who know that 
the day has come v»^en America is privileged to spend her 
blood and her mJght for the principles that gave her birth 
and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God 
helping her, she can do no other. 

White House Pamphlet. 



58. THE AMERICAN PEOPLE MUST SUPPORT THE 

WAR 

(April 16, 191 7) 

Public Appeal by the President to His Fellow 
Countrymen 

The entrance of our own beloved country into the grim 
and terrible war for democracy and human rights which has 
shaken the world creates so many problems of national life 
and action which call for immediate consideration and settle- 
ment that I hope you will permit me to address to you a few 
words of earnest counsel and appeal with regard to them. 

We are rapidly putting our navy upon an effective war 
footing and are about to create and equip a great army, but 
these are the simplest parts of the great task to which we 
have addressed ourselves. There is not a single selfish ele- 
ment, so far as I can see, in the cause we are fighting for. 



igS ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

We are fighting for what we believe and wish to be the rights 
of mankind and for the future peace and security of the 
world. To do this great thing worthily and successfully we 
must devote ourselves to the service without regard to profit 
or material advantage and with an energy and intelligence 
that will rise to the level of the enterprise itself. We must 
realize to the full how great the task is and how many 
things, and how many kinds and elements of capacity and 
service and self-sacrifice, it involves. 

These, then, are the things we must do, and do well, be- 
sides fighting, — the things without which mere fighting would 
be fruitless: 

We must supply abundant food for ourselves and for our 
armies and our seamen not only, but also for a large part of 
the nations with whom we have now made common cause, 
in whose support and by whose sides we shall be fighting; 

We must supply ships by the hundreds out of our ship- 
yards to carry to the other side of the sea, submarines or no 
submarines, what will every day be needed there, and abun- 
dant materials out of our fields and our mines and our 
factories with which not only to clothe and equip our own 
forces on land and sea but also to clothe and support our 
people for whom the gallant fellows under arms can no 
longer work, to help clothe and equip the armies with which 
we are cooperating in Europe, and to keep the looms and 
manufactories there in raw material; coal to keep the fires 
going in ships at sea and in the furnaces of hundreds of 
factories across the sea; steel out of which to make arms 
and ammunition both here and there; rails for worn-out 
railways back of the fighting fronts; locomotives and rolling 
stock to take the place of those every day going to pieces; 
mules, horses, cattle for labor and for military service; 
everything with which the people of England and France 
and Italy and Russia have usually supplied themselves but 
can not now afford the men, the materials, or the machinery 
to make. 

It is evident to every thinking man that our industries, 
on the farms, in the shipyards, in the mines, in the factories, 
must be made more prolific and more efficient than ever 
and that they must be more economically managed and 



Apr. 1 6] PEOPLE MUST SUPPORT THE WAR 199 

better adapted to the particular requirements of our task 
than they have been; and what I want to say is that the 
men and the women who devote their thought and their 
energy to these things will be serving the country and con- 
ducting the fight for peace and freedom just as truly and 
just as effectively as the men on the battlefield or in the 
trenches. The industrial forces of the country, men and 
women alike, will be a great national, a great international, 
Service Army, — a notable and honored host engaged in the 
service of the nation and the world, the efficient friends and 
saviors of free men everywhere. Thousands, nay, hundreds 
of thousands, of men otherwise liable to military service will 
of right and of necessity be excused from that service and 
assigned to the fundamental, sustaining work of the fields 
and factories and mines, and they will be as much part of 
the great patriotic forces of the nation as the men under 
fire. 

I take the liberty, therefore, of addressing this word to 
the farmers of the country and to all who work on the 
farms: The supreme need of our own nation and of the 
nations with which we are cooperating is an abundance of 
supplies, and especially of food stuffs. The importance of 
an adequate food supply, especially for the present year, 
is superlative. Without abundant food, alike for the armies 
and the peoples now at war, the whole great enterprise upon 
which we have embarked will break down and fail. The 
world's food reserves are low. Not only during the present \ 
emergency but for some time after peace shall have come < 
both our own people and a large proportion of the people 
of Europe must rely upon the harvests in America. Upon 
the farmers of this country, therefore, in large measure, rests 
the fate of the war and the fate of the nations. May the 
nation not count upon them to omit no step that will increase 
the production of their land or that will bring about the 
most effectual cooperation in the sale and distribution of 
their products? The time is short. It is of the most im- 
perative importance that everything possible be done and , 
done immediately to make sure of large harvests. I call 
upon young men and old alike and upon the able-bodied 
boys of the land to accept and act upon this duty — to turn 



200 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

in hosts to the farms and make certain that no pains and 
no labor is lacking in this great matter. 

I particularly appeal to the farmers of the South to plant 
abundant food stuffs as well as cotton. They can shovr their 
patriotism in no better or more convincing way than by 
resisting the great temptation of the present price of cotton 
and helping, helping upon a great scale, to feed the nation 
and the peoples everywhere who are fighting for their liberties 
and for our own. The variety of their crops will be the 
visible measure of their comprehension of their national duty. 

The Government of the United States and the govern- 
ments of the several States stand ready to cooperate. They 
will do everything possible to assist farmers in securing an 
adequate supply of seed, an adequate force of laborers when 
they are most needed, at harvest time, and the means of 
expediting shipments of fertilizers and farm machinery, as 
well as of the crops themselves when harvested. The course 
of trade shall be as unhampered as it is possible to make it 
and there shall be no unwarranted manipulation of the 
nation's food supply by those who handle it on its way to 
the consumer. This is our opportunity to demonstrate the 
efficiency of a gTeat Democracy and we shall not fall short 
of it! 

This let me say to the middlemen of every sort, whether 
they are handling our food stuffs or our raw materials of 
manufacture or the products of our mills and factories: The 
eyes of the country will be especially upon you. This is 
your opportunity for signal service, efficient and disinter- 
ested. The country expects you, as it expects all others, to 
forego profits, to organize and expedite shipments of sup- 
plies of every kind, but especially of food, -with an eye to 
the service you are rendering and in the spirit of those who 
enlist in the ranks, for their people, not for themselves. I 
shall confidently expect you to deserve and win the con- 
fidence of people of every sort and station. 

To the men who run the railways of the country, whether 
they be managers or operative employees, let me say that 
the railways are the arteries of the nation's life and that 
upon them rests the immense responsibility of seeing to it 
that those arteries suffer no obstruction of any kind, no 



Apr. 1 6] PEOPLE MUST SUPPORT THE WAR 2ci 

inefficiency or slackened power. Tj the merchant let me 
suggest the motto, "Small profits and quick service;" and to 
the shipbuilder the thought that the life of the war depends 
upon him. The food and the war iipplies must be carried 
across the seas no matter how many ships are sent to the 
bottom. The places of those that go down must be sup- 
plied and supplied at once. To the miner let me say that 
he stands where the farmer does: the work of the world 
waits on him. If he slackens or fails, armies and statesmen 
are helpless. He also is enilsted in the great Service Army. 
The manufacturer does not need to be told, I hope, that the 
nation looks to him to speed and perfect every process; , 
and I want only to remind his employees that their service 
is absolutely indispensable and is counted on by every man 
who loves the country and its liberties. 

Let me suggest, also, that everyone who creates or culti- 
vates a garden helps, and helps greatly, to solve the problem 
of the feeding of the nations; and that every housewife who 
practices strict economy puts herself in the ranks of those 
who serve the nation. This is the time for America to 
correct her unpardonable fault of wastefulness and extrava- 
gance. Let every man and every woman assume the duty 
of careful, provident use and expenditure as a public duty, 
as a dictate of patriotism which no one can now expect ever 
to be excused or forgiven for ignoring. 

In the hope that this statement of the needs of the nation 
and of the world in this hour of supreme crisis may stimu- 
late those to whom it comes and remind all who need re- 
minder of the solemn duties of a time such as the world has 
never seen before, I beg that all editors and publishers every- 
where will give as prominent publication and as wide circula- 
tion as possible to this appeal. I venture to suggest, also, 
to all advertising agencies that they would perhaps render a 
very substantial and timely service to the country if they 
would give it widespread repetition. And I hope that clergy- j 
men will not think the theme of it an unworthy or inappro- 
priate subject of comment and homily from their pulpits. I 

The supreme test of the nation has come. We must all/ 
speak, act, and serve together! 

IVMte House Pamphlet. 



202 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

59. THE RED CROSS 

(May 12, 1917) 

Address at the Dedication of the Red Cross Building 
IN Washington 

It gives me a very deep gratification as the titular head 
of the American Red Cross to accept in the name of that 
association this significant and beautiful gift, the gift of 
the Government and of private individuals who have con- 
ceived their duty in a noble spirit and upon a great scale. 
It seems to me that the architecture of the building, to which 
the secretary alluded, suggests something very significant. 

There are few buildings in Washington more simple in 
their lines and in their ornamentation than the beautiful 
building w^e are dedicating this evening. It breathes a 
spirit of modesty and seems to adorn duty with its proper 
garment of beauty. It is significant that it should be dedi- 
cated tj women who serv^ed to alleviate suffering and com- 
fort those who were in need during our Civil War, because 
their thoughtful, disinterested, self-sacrificing devotion is the 
spirit which should always illustrate the services of the Red 
Cross. 

The Red Cross needs at this time more than it ever needed 
before the comprehending support of the American people 
and all the facilities w^hich could be placed at its disposal to 
perform its duties adequately and efficiently. I believe that 
the American people perhaps hardly yet realize the sacri- 
fices and sufferings that are before them. We thought the 
scale of our Civil War was unprecedented, but in compari- 
son with the struggle into which we have now entered the 
Civil War seems almost insignificant in its proportions and 
in its expenditure of treasure and of blood. And therefore 
it is a matter of the greatest importance that we should at 
the outset see to it that the i\merican Red Cross is equipped 
and prepared for the things that lie before it. 

It will be our instrument to do the works of alleviation 
and mercy which will attend this struggle. Of course, the 
scale upon which it shall act will be greater than the scale 



May 12] THE RED CROSS 203 

of any other duty that it has ever attempted to perform. 
It is in recognition of that fact that the American Red 
Cross has just added to its organization a small body of 
men whom it has chosen to call its war council — not be- 
cause they are to counsel war, but because they are to serve 
in this special war those purposes of counsel which have 
become so imperatively necessary. Their first duty will be 
to raise a great fund out of which to draw the resources 
for the performance of their duty, and I do not believe that 
it will be necessary to appeal to the American people to re- 
spond to their call for funds, because the heart of this coun- 
try is in this war, and if the heart of the country is in the 
war, its heart will express itself in the gifts that will be 
poured out for these humane purposes. I say the heart of 
the country is in this w^ar because it would not have gone 
into it if its heart had not been prepared for it. It would 
not have gone into it if it had not first believed that here 
was an opportunity to express the character of the United 
States. We have gone in with no special grievance of our 
own, because we have always said that we were the friends 
and the servants of mankind. 

We look for no profit. We look for no advantage. We 
will accept no advantage out of this war. We go because 
we believe that the very principles upon which the American 
Republic was founded are now^ at stake and must be vindi- 
cated. In such a contest, therefore, we shall not fail to re- 
spond to the call to service that comes through the instru- 
mentality of this particular organization. And I think it not 
inappropriate to say this: There will be many expressions of 
the spirit of sympathy and mercy and philanthropy, and I 
think that it is very necessary that we should not disperse 
our activities in those lines too much; that we should keep 
constantly in view the desire to have the utmost concen- 
tration and efficiency of effort, and I hope the most, if not 
all of the philanthropic activities of this war may be exer- 
cised if not through the Red Cross, then through some 
already-constituted and experienced organization. 

This is no war for amateurs. This is no war for mere 
spontaneous impulse. It means grim business on every side 
of it, and it is the mere counsel of prudence that in our 



204 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191 7 

philanthrop}'' as well as in our fighting we should act through 
the instrumentalities already prepared to our hand and 
already experienced in the tasks which are going to be 
assigned to them. This should be merely the expression 
of the practical genius of America itself, and I believe 
that the practical genius of America \^'ill dictate that the 
efforts in this war in this particular field should be con- 
centrated in experienced hands as our efforts in other fields 
will be. 

There is another thing that is significant and delightful 
to my thought about the fact that this building should be 
dedicated to the memory of the women both of the North 
and of the South. It is a sort of landmark of the unity to 
which the people have been brought, so far as any old ques- ■ 
tion which tore our hearts in days gone by is concerned; j 
and T pray God that the outcome of this struggle may be I 
that every other element of difference amongst us will be | 
obliterated and that some day historians will remember these 
momentous years as the years which made a single people 
out of the great body of those who call themselves Ameri- 
cans. The evidences are already many that this is happen- 
ing. The divisions which were predicted have not occurred 
and will no! occur. The spirit of this people is already 
united, and when effort and suffering and sacrifice have 
completed the union, men will no longer speak of any lines 
either of race or of association cutting athwart the great 
body of this Nation. So that I feel that we are now begin- 
ning the processes which will some day require another 
beautiful memorial erected to those whose hearts uniting 
united America. } 

Congressional Record, LV, 2500. | 



60. OBJECTS IN GOING TO WAR : 

(May 22, 1917) ; 

Letter to Representative Heflin 

^It is incomprehensible to me how any frank or honest 
person could doubt or question my position with regard to 



May 22] OBJECTS IN GOING TO WAR 205 

the war and its objects. I have again and again stated the 
very serious and long-continued wrongs which the Imperial 
German Government has perpetrated against the rights, the 
commerce, and the citizens of the United States. The list 
is long and overwhelming. No nation that respected itself 
or the rights of humanity could have borne those wrongs any 
longer. 

Our objects in going into the war have been stated with 
equal clearness. The whole of the conception which I take 
to be the conception of our fellow countrymen with regard 
to the outcome of the war and the terms of its settlement I 
set forth with the utmost explicitness in an address to the 
Senate of the United States on the 2 2d of January last. 
Again, in my message to Congress on the 2d of April last 
those objects were stated in unmistakable terms. I can con- 
ceive no purpose in seeking to becloud this matter except the 
purpose of weakening the hands of the Government and 
making the part which the United States is to play in this 
great struggle for human liberty an inefficient and hesitating 
part. We have entered the war for our own reasons and 
with our own objects clearly stated, and shall forget neither 
the reasons nor the objects. There is no hate in our hearts 
for the German people, but there is a resolve which cannot 
be shaken even by misrepresentation to overcome the pre- 
tensions of the autocratic Government w^hich acts upon pur- 
poses to which the German people have never consented. 

Official Bulletin, May 23, 191 7. 



61. NEED OF A CENSORSHIP LAW 

(May 22, 1917) 

Letter to Representative Webb 

I have been very much surprised to find several of the 
public prints stating that the administration had abandoned 
the position which it so distinctly took, and still holds, that 
authority to exercise censorship over the press to the extent 
that that censorship is embodied in the recent action of the 



2o6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 



17 \ 



House of Representatives is absolutely necessary to the 
public safety. It, of course, has not been abandoned, because 
the reasons still exist why such authority is necessary for 
the protection of the Nation. 

I have every confidence that the great majority of the 
newspapers of the country will observe a patriotic reticence 
about everything whose publication could be of injury, but 
in every country there are some persons in a position to do 
mischief in this field who can not be relied upon and whose 
interests or desires will lead to actions on their part highly 
dangerous to the Nation in the midst of a war. I want to 
say again that it seems to me imperative that powers of this 
sort should be granted. 

Congressional Record, LV, 3144. 



62. FRIENDSHIP WITH RUSSIA 

(May 26, 1917) 
Cablegram to Russia 

In view of the approaching visit of the American delega- 
tion to Russia to express the deep friendship of the Ameri- 
can people for the people of Russia and to discuss the best 
and most practical means of cooperation between the two 
peoples in carrying the present struggle for the freedom of 
all peoples to a successful consummation, it seems oppor- 
tune and appropriate that I should state again, in the light 
of this new partnership, the objects the United States has 
had in mind in entering the war. Those objects have been 
very much beclouded during the past few weeks by mis- 
taken and misleading statements, and the issues at stake 
are too momentous, too tremendous, too significant for the 
whole human race to permit any misinterpretations or mis- 
understandings, however slight, to remain uncorrected for a 
moment. 

The war has begun to go against Germany, and in their 
desperate desire to escape the inevitable ultimate defeat, 
those who are in authority in Germany are using every pos- 



May 26] FRIENDSHIP WITH RUSSIA 207 

sible instrumentality, are making use even of the influence 
of groups and parties among their o\to subjects to whom 
they have never been just or fair, or even tolerant, to pro- 
mote a propaganda on both sides of the sea which will pre- 
serve for them their influence at home and their power 
abroad, to the undoing of the very men they are using. 

The position of America in this war is so clearly avowed 
that no man can be excused for mistaking it. She seeks no 
material profit or aggrandizement of any kind. She is fight- 
ing for no advantage or selfish object of her own, but for 
the liberation of peoples everywhere from the aggressions of 
autocratic force. The ruling classes in Germany have be- 
gun of late to profess a like liberality and justice of pur- 
pose, but only to preserve the power they have set up in 
Germany and the selfish advantages which they have 
wrongly gained for themselves and their private projects 
of power all the way from Berlin to Bagdad and beyond. 
Government after Government has by their influence, with- 
out open conquest of its territory, been linked together in a 
net of intrig-ue directed against nothing less than the peace 
and liberty of the world. The meshes of that intrigue must 
be broken, but can not be broken unless wrongs already 
done are undone, and adequate measures must be taken to 
prevent it from ever again being rewoven or repaired. 

Of course, the Imperial German Government and those 
whom it is using for their owti undoing are seeking to obtain 
pledges that the war will end in the restoration of the status 
quo ante. It was the status quo ante out of which this iniqui- 
tous war issued forth, the power of the Imperial German Gov- 
ernment within the Empire and its widespread domination 
and influence outside of that Empire. That status must be 
altered in such fashion as to prevent any such hideous thing 
from ever happening again. 

We are fighting for the liberty, the self-government, and 
the undictated development of all peoples, and every fea- 
ture of the settlement that concludes this war must be con- 
ceived and executed for that purpose. Wrongs must first be 
righted and then adequate safeguards must be created to 
prevent their being committed again. We ought not to 
consider remedies merely because they have a pleasing and 



2o8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDExNT WILSON [1917 

sonorous sound. Practical questions can be settled only by- 
practical means. Phrases will not accomplish the result. 
Effective readjustments will, and whatever readjustments 
are necessary must be made. 

But they must follow a principle and that principle is 
plain. No people must be forced under sovereignty under 
which it does not ^^^sh to live. No territory must change 
hands except for the purpose of securing those who inhabit 
it a fair chance of life and liberty. No indemnities must 
be insisted on except those that constitute payments for 
manifest wrongs done. No readjustments of power must 
be made except such as will tend to secure the future peace 
of the world and the future welfare and happiness of its 
peoples. 

And then the free peoples of the world must draw to- 
gether in some common covenant, some genuine and prac- 
tical cooperation that will in effect combine their force to 
secure peace and justice in the dealings of nations with 
one another. The brotherhood of mankind must no longer 
be a fair but empty phrase; it must be given a structure of 
force and reality. The nations must realize their common 
life and effect a workable partnership to secure that life 
against the aggressions of autocratic and self-pleasing power. 

For these things we can afford to pour out blood and 
treasure. For these are the things we have always pro- 
fessed to desire, and unless we pour out blood and treasure 
now and succeed we may never be able to unite or show 
conquering force again in the great cause of human liberty. 
The day has come to conquer or submit. If the forces of 
autocracy can divide us they will overcome us; if we stand 
together victory is certain and the liberty which victory 
will secure. We can afford then to be generous, but we 
cannot afford then or now to be weak or omit any single 
guarantee of justice and security. 

Official Bulletin, June 9, 191 7. 



May 30] DEFENDERS OF AMERICAN HONOR 209 
63. DEFENDERS OF AMERICAN HONOR 

(May 30, 191 7) 

Address at Arlington Cemetery 

The program has conferred an unmerited dignity upon 
the remarks I am going to make by calling them an address, 
because I am not here to deliver an address. I am here 
merely to show in my official capacity the sympathy of this 
great Government with the object of this occasion, and 
also to speak just a word of the sentiment that is in my 
own heart. 

Any Memorial Day of this sort is, of course, a day touched 
with sorrowful memory, and yet I for one do not see how we 
can have any thought of pity for the men whose memory we 
honor to-day. I do not pity them. I envy them, rather; 
because theirs is a great work for liberty accomplished and 
we are in the midst of a work unfinished, testing our 
strength where their strength already has been tested. 

There is a touch of sorrow, but there is a touch of reas- 
surance also in a day like this, because we know how the 
men of America have responded to the call of the cause of 
liberty and it fills our mind with a perfect assurance that 
that response will come again in equal measures, with equal 
majesty, and with a result w^hich will hold the attention of 
all mankind. When you reflect upon it, these men who 
died to preserve the Union died to preserve the instrument 
which we are now using to serve the world — a free Nation 
espousing the cause of human liberty. In one sense the great 
struggle into which we have now entered is an American 
struggle, because it is in the defense of American honor and 
American rights, but it is something even greater than that; 
it is a world struggle. It is the struggle of men who love 
liberty everywhere, and in this cause America will show 
herself greater than ever because she will rise to a greater 
thing. We have said in the beginning that we planted this 
great Government that men who wish freedom might have a 
place of refuge and a place where their hope could be 
realized, and now, having established such a Government, 



2:0 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

having preserved such a Government, having vindicated the 
power of such a Government, we are saying to all mankind, 
"We did not set this Government up in order that we might 
have a selfish and separate liberty, for we are now ready 
to come to your assistance and fight out upon the field of the 
world the cause of human liberty." In this thing America 
attains her full dignity and the full fruition of her great 
purpose. 

No man can be glad that such things have happened as 
we have witnessed in these last fateful years, but perhaps 
it may be permitted to us to be glad that we have an oppor- 
tunity to show the principles that we profess to be living 
principles that live in our hearts, and to have a chance by 
the pouring out of our blood and treasure to vindicate the 
thing w^hich we have professed. For, my friends, the real 
fruition of life is to do the things we have said we wished 
to do. There are times when words seem empty and only 
action seems great. Such a time has come, and in the provi- 
dence of God America will once more have an opportunity 
to show to the world that she was born to serve mankind. 

Official Bulletin, May 31, 19 17. 

64. INSULTS AND AGGRESSIONS OF GERMANY 

(June 14, 1917) 

Address on Flag Day at Washington 

My Fellow Citizens: We meet to celebrate Flag Day be- 
cause this flag w^hich we honor and under which w^e serve 
is the emblem of our unity, our power, our thought and pur- 
pose as a nation. It has no other character than that which 
we give it from generation to generation. The choices are 
ours. It floats in majestic silence above the hosts that exe- 
cute those choices, whether in peace or in war. And yet, 
though silent, it speaks to us, — speaks to us of the past, of 
the men and w^omen who went before us and of the records 
they wrote upon it. We celebrate the day of its birth; 
and from its birth until now it has witnessed a great history, 
has floated on high the symbol of great events, of a great 



June 14] GERMANY'S AGGRESSIONS 211 

plan of life worked out by a great people. We are about 
to carry it into battle, to lift it where it will draw the fire 
of our enemies. We are about to bid thousands, hundreds 
of thousands, it may be millions, of our men, the young, 
the strong, the capable men of the nation, to go forth and 
die beneath it on fields of blood far away, — for what? For 
some unaccustomed thing? For something for which it has 
never sought the fire before? American armies were never 
before sent across the seas. Why are they sent now? For 
some new purpose, for which this great flag has never been 
carried before, or for some old, familiar, heroic purpose for 
which it has seen men, its own men, die on every battlefield 
upon which Americans have borne arms since the Revo- 
lution? 

These are questions which must be answered. We are 
Americans. We in our turn serve America, and can serve 
her with no private purpose. W^e must use her flag as she 
has always used it. We are accountable at the bar of history 
and must plead in utter frankness what purpose it is we 
seek to serve. 

It is plain enough how we were forced into the war. The 
extraordinary insults and aggressions of the Imperial Ger- 
man Government left us no self-respecting choice but to take 
up arms in defense of our rights as a free people and of 
our honor as a sovereign government. The military masters 
of Germ.any denied us the right to be neutral. They filled 
our unsuspecting communities with vicious spies and con- 
spirators and sought to corrupt the opinion of our people 
in their own behalf. When they found that they could not 
do that, their agents diligently spread sedition amongst us 
and sought to draw our own citizens from their allegiance, 
— and some of those agents were men connected with the 
official Em.bassy of the German Government itself here in 
our own capital. They sought by violence to destroy our 
industries and arrest our commerce. They tried to incite 
Mexico to take up arms against us and to draw Japan into a 
hostile alliance with her, — and that, not by indirection, but 
by direct suggestion from the Foreign Office in Berlin. They 
impudently denied us the use of the high seas and repeatedly 
executed their threat that they would send to their death 



212 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

any of our people who ventured to approach the coasts of 
Europe. And many of our own people were corrupted. Men 
began to look upon their own neighbors with suspicion and 
to wonder in their hot resentment and surprise whetTier there 
was any community in which hostile intrigue did not lurk. 
VvTiat great nation in such circum.stances would not have 
taken up arms? Much as we had desired peace, it was 
denied us, and not of our own choice. This flag under 
which we serve would have been dishonored had we withheld 
our hand. 

But that is only part of the story. We know now as 
clearly as we knew before we were ourselves engaged that 
we are not the enemies of the German people and that they 
are not our enemies. They did not originate or desire this 
hideous war or wish that we should be drawn into it; and 
we are vaguely conscious that we are fighting their cause, 
as they will some day see it, as well as our own. They 
are themselves in the grip of the same sinister power that 
has now at last stretched its ugly talons out and drawn blood 
from us. The whole world is at war because the whole 
world is in the grip of that power and is trying out the 
great battle w^hich shall determine whether it is to be brought 
under its mastery or fling itself free. 

The war w^as begun by the military masters of Germany, 
who proved to be also the masters of Austria-Hungary. 
These men have never regarded nations as peoples, for whom 
governments existed and in w^hom governments had their 
life. They have regarded them merely as serviceable organi- 
zations which they could by force or intrigue bend or cor- 
rupt to their own purpose. They have regarded the smaller 
states, in particular, and the peoples who could be over- 
whelmed by force, as their natural tools and instruments of 
domination. Their purpose has long been avowed. The 
statesmen of other nations, to whom that purpose was in- 
credible, paid little attention; regarded what German pro- 
fessors expounded in their classrooms and German writers 
set forth to the world as the goal of German policy as rather 
the dream of minds detached from practical affairs, as pre- 
posterous private conceptions of German destiny, than as 
the actual plans of responsible rulers; but the rulers of Ger- 



June 14] GERMANY'S AGGRESSIONS 213 

many themselves knew all the while what concrete plans, 
what well advanced intrigues lay back of what the pro- 
fessors and the writers were saying, and were glad to go 
forward unmolested, filling the thrones of Balkan states with 
German princes, putting German officers at the service of 
Turkey to drill her armies and make interest with her 
government, developing plans of sedition and rebellion in 
India and Egypt, setting their fires in Persia. The demands 
made by Austria upon Serbia were a mere single step in a 
plan which compassed Europe and Asia, from Berlin to 
Bagdad. They hoped those demands might not arouse 
Europe, but they m.eant to press them whether they did or 
not, for they thought themselves ready for the final issue 
of arms. 

Their plan was to throw a broad belt of German military 
power and political control across the very centre of Europe 
and beyond the Mediterranean into the heart of Asia; and 
Austria-Hungary was to be as much their tool and pawn as 
Serbia or Bulgaria or Turkey or the ponderous states of the 
East. Austria-Hungary, indeed, was to become part of the 
central German Empire, absorbed and dominated by the 
same forces and influences that had originally cemented the 
German states themselves. The dream had its heart at 
Berlin. It could have had a heart nowhere else! It rejected 
the idea of solidarity of race entirely. The choice of peoples 
played no part in it at all. It contemplated binding to- 
gether racial and political units which could be kept together 
only by force,— Czechs, Magyars, Croats, Serbs, Rouma- 
nians, Turks, Armenians,— the proud states of Bohemia and 
Hungary, the stout little commonwealths ot the Balkans, 
the indomitable Turks, the subtile peoples of the East. 
These peoples did not wish to be united. They ardently 
desired to direct their own affairs, would be satisfied only 
by undisputed independence. They could be kept quiet only 
by the presence or the constant threat of armed men. They 
vyould live under a common power only by sheer compul- 
sion and await the day of revolution. But the German 
military statesmen had reckoned with all that and were 
ready to deal with it in their own way. 

And they have actually carried the greater part of that 



214 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

amazing plan into execution! Look how things stand. 
Austria is at their mercy. It has acted, not upon its own 
initiative or upon the choice of its own people, but at Berlin's 
dictation ever since the war began. Its people now desire 
peace, but cannot have it until leave is granted from Berlin. 
The so-called Central Powers are in fact but a single Power. 
Serbia is at its m.ercy, should its hands be but for a moment 
freed. Bulgaria has consented to its will, and Roumania is 
overrun. The Turkish armies, which Germans trained, are 
serving German}^, certainly not themselves, and the guns of 
German warships lying in the harbor at Constantinople re- 
mind Turkish statesmen every day that they have no choice 
but to take their orders from Berlin. From Hamburg to 
the Persian Gulf the net is spread. 

Is it not easy to understand the eagerness for peace that 
has been manifested from Berlin ever since the snare was 
set and sprung? Peace, peace, peace has been the talk of 
her Foreign Office for now a year and more; not peace upon 
her own initiative, but upon the initiative of the nations 
over which she now deems herself to hold the advantage. 
A little of the talk has been public, but most of it has been 
private. Through all sorts of channels it has come to me, 
and in all sorts of guises, but never with the term.s disclosed 
which the German Government would be willing to accept. 
That government has other valuable pawms in its hands 
besides those I have mentioned. It still holds a valuble part 
of France, though with slowly relaxing grasp, and practically 
the whole of Belgim. Its armies press close upon Russia 
and overrun Poland at their \\ill. It cannot go further; it 
dare not go back. It \vishes to close its bargain before it is 
too late and it has little left to offer for the pound of flesh it 
will demand. 

The militar}^ masters under whom Germany is bleeding 
see very clearly to what point Fate has brought them. If 
they fall back or are forced back an inch, their power both 
abroad and at home will fall to pieces like a house of cards. 
It is their power at home they are thinking about now more 
than their power abroad. It is that power which is trem- 
bling under their very feet; and deep fear has entered their 
hearts. They have but one chance to perpetuate their mili- 



June 14] GERMANY'S AGGRESSIONS 215 

tary power or even their controlling political influence. If 
they can secure peace now with the immense advantages 
still in their hands which they have up to this point appar- 
ently gained, they will have justified themselves before the 
German people: they will have gained by force what they 
promised to gain by it: an immense expansion of German 
power, an immense enlargement of German industrial and 
commercial opportunities. Their prestige will be secure, and 
with their prestige their political power. If they fail, their 
people will thrust them aside; a government accountable to 
the people themselves will be set up in Germany as it has 
been in England, in the United States, in France, and in 
all the great countries of the modern time except Germany. 
If they succeed they are safe and Germany and the world 
are undone; if they fail Germany is saved and the world will 
be at peace. If they succeed, America will fall within the 
menace. We and all the rest of the world must remain 
armed, as they will remain, and must m.ake ready for the 
next step in their aggression; if they fail, the world may 
unite for -peace and Germany may be of the union. 

Do you not now understand the new intrigue, the intrigue 
for peace, and why the masters of Germany do not hesitate 
to use any agency that promises to effect their purpose, the 
deceit of the nations? Their present particular aim is to 
deceive all those who throughout the world stand for the 
rights of peoples and the self-government of nations; for 
they see what immense strength the forces of justice and of 
liberalism are gathering out of this war. They are employ- 
ing liberals in their enterprise. They are using men, in 
Germany and without, as their spokesmen whom they have 
hitherto despised and oppressed, using them for their own 
destruction, — socialists, the leaders of labor, the thinkers they 
have hitherto sought to silence. Let them once succeed and 
these men, now their tools, will be ground to powder beneath 
the weight of the great military empire they will have set 
up; the revolutionists in Russia will be cut off from all 
succor or cooperation in western Europe and a counter revo- 
lution fostered and supported; Germany herself will lose her 
chance of freedom; and all Europe will arm for the next, 
the final struggle. 



2i6 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

The sinister intrigue is being no less actively conducted in 
this country than in Russia and in every country in Europe 
to which the agents and dupes of the Imperial German 
Government can get access. That government has many 
spokesmen here, in places high and low. They have learned 
discretion. They keep within the law. It is opinion they 
utter now, not sedition. They proclaim the liberal pur- 
poses of their masters; declare this a foreign war which can 
touch America with no danger to either her lands or her 
institutions; set England at the centre of the stage and talk 
of her ambition to assert economic dominion throughout the 
world; appeal to our ancient tradition of isolation in the 
politics of the nations; and seek to undermine the govern- 
ment with false professions of loyalty to its principles. 

But they will make no headway. The false betray them- 
selves always in every accent. It is only friends and par- 
tisans of the German Government whom we have already 
identified who utter these thinly disguised disloyalties. The 
facts are patent to all the world, and nowhere are they more 
plainly seen than in the United States, where we are accus- 
tomed to deal with facts and not with sophistries; and the 
great fact that stands out above all the rest is that this is a 
Peoples' War, a war for freedom and justice and self-gov- 
ernment amongst all the nations of the world, a war to make 
the world safe for the peoples who live upon it and have 
made it their own, the German people themselves included; 
and that with us rests the choice to break through all these 
hypocrisies and patent cheats and masks of brute force and 
help set the world free, or else stand aside and let it be domi- 
nated a long age through by sheer weight of arms and the 
arbitrary choices of self-constituted masters, by the nation 
which can maintain the biggest armies and the most irre- 
sistible armaments, — a power to which the world has afforded 
no parallel and in the face of which political freedom must 
wither and perish. 

For us there is but one choice. We have made it. Woe 
be to the man or group of men that seeks to stand in our 
way in this day of high resolution wiien every principle we 
hold dearest is to be vindicated and made secure for the 
salvation of the nations. We are ready to plead at the bar 



June 14] GERMANY'S AGGRESSIONS 217 

of history, and our flag shall wear a new lustre. Once more 
we shall make good with our lives and fortunes the great 
faith to which we were bom, and a new glory shall shine 
in the face of our people. 

White House Pamphlet. 



65. GREETING TO FRENCH DEMOCRACY 

(July 14, 1917) 

Cablegram to the French Government 

On this anniversary of the birth of democracy in France, 
I offer on behalf of my countr3mien, and on my own behalf, 
fraternal greeting as befits the strong ties that unite our 
peoples who to-day stand shoulder to shoulder in defense of 
liberty in testimony of the steadfast purpose of our two 
countries to achieve victory for the sublime cause of the 
rights of the people against oppression. The lesson of the 
Bastile is not lost to the world of free peoples. May the 
day be near when on the ruins of the dark stronghold of 
unbridled power and conscienceless autocracy, the nobler 
structure, upbuilt like your own. great Republic on the eternal 
foundation of peace and right, shall arise to gladden an en- 
franchised world. 

New York Times, July 17, 19 17. 

66. THE BIBLE AND THE SOLDIER 

(August, 191 7) 

Message to Soldiers and Sailors 

The Bible is the word of life. I beg that you will read 
it and find this out for yourselves — read, not little snatches 
here and there, but long passages that will really be the 
road to the heart of it. You will find it full of real men and 
women not only but also of things you have wondered about 



2i8 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

and been troubled about all your life, as men have been 
always; and the more you read the more it will become plain 
to you w^hat things are worth while and what are not, what 
things make men happy — loyalty, right dealings, speaking 
the truth, readiness to give everything for what they think 
their duty, and, most of all, the wish that they may have 
the real approval of the Christ, who gave everything for 
them — and the things that are guaranteed to make men 
unhappy — selfishness, cowardice, greed, and everything that 
is low and mean. When you have read the Bible you will 
know that it is the Word of God, because you will have 
found it the key to your own. heart, your own happiness, and 
your own duty. 

Congressional Record, LV, 6041. 



67. PATRIOTIC TEACHING IN SCHOOLS 

(August 23, 1917) 
Public Appeal to School Officers 

The war is bringing to the minds of our people a new 
appreciation of the problems of national life and a deeper 
understanding of the meaning and aims of democracy. Mat- 
ters which heretofore have seemed commonplace and trivial 
are seen in a truer light. The urgent demand for the pro- 
duction and proper distribution of food and other national 
resources has made us aware of the close dependence of 
individual on individual and nation on nation. The effort 
to keep up social and industrial organizations in spite of 
the withdrawal of men for the army has revealed the extent 
to which modem life has become complex and specialized. 

These and other lessons of the war must be learned quickly 
if we are intelligently and successfully to defend our institu- 
tions. WTien the war is over we must apply the wisdom 
which we have acquired in purging and ennobling the life of 
the w^orld. 

In these vital tasks of acquiring a broader view of human 
possibilities the common school must have a large part. I 



Aug. 23] PATRIOTIC TEACHING IN SCHOOLS 219 

urge that teachers and other school officers increase materi- 
ally the tinr"^ and attention devoted to instruction bearing 
directly on the problems of community and national life. 

Such a plea is in no way foreign to the spirit of American 
public education or of existing practices. Nor is it a plea 
for a temporary enlargement of the school program appro- 
priate merely to the period of the war. It is a plea for a 
realization in public education of the new emphasis which 
the war has given to the ideals of democracy and to the 
broader conceptions of national life. 

In order that there may be definite material at hand with 
which the schools may at once expand their teaching I have 
asked Mr. Hoover and Commissioner Claxton to organize the 
proper agencies for the preparation and distribution of suit- 
able lessons for the elementary grades and for the high 
school classes. Lessons thus suggested will serve the double 
purpose of illustrating in a concrete way what can be under- 
taken in the schools and of stimulating teachers in all parts 
of the country to formulate new and appropriate materials 
drawn directly from the communities in w^hich they live. 

Issued by U. S. Board of Education. 

68. PAPAL PROPOSITIONS OF PEACE 

(August 27, 19 1 7) 

Reply to the Pope Through Secretary Lansing 

In acknowledgment of the communication of Your Holi- 
ness to the belligerent peoples, dated August i, 19 17, the 
President of the United States requests me to transmit the 
following reply: 

Every heart that has not been blinded and hardened by 
this terrible war must be touched by this moving appeal of 
His Holiness the Pope, must feel the dignity and force of 
the humane and generous motives which prompted it, and 
must fervently Vv'ish that we might take the path of peace he 
so persuasively points out. But it would be folly to take it 
if it does not in fact lead to the goal he proposes. Our 
response must be based upon the stem facts and upon 



220 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

nothing else. It is not a mere cessation of arms he desires; 
it is a stable and enduring peace. This agony must not be 
gone through with again, and it must be a matter of very- 
sober judgment what will insure us against it. 

His Holiness in substance proposes that we return to the 
status quo ante bellum, and that then there be a general 
condonation, disarmament, and a concert of nations based 
upon an acceptance of the principle of arbitration ; that by a 
similar concert freedom of the seas be established; and that 
the territorial claims of France and Italy, the perplexing 
problem.s of the Balkan States, and the restitution of Poland 
be left to such conciliatory adjustments as ma}^ be possible 
in the new temper of such a peace, due regard being paid 
to the aspirations of the peoples whose political fortunes and 
affiliations will be involved. 

It is manifest that no part of this program can be success- 
fully carried out unless the restitution of the status quo ante 
furnishes a firm and satisfactory basis for it. The object 
of this war is to deliver the free peoples of the world from 
the menace of the actual power of a vast military establish- 
ment controlled by an irresponsible government which, hav- 
ing secretly planned to dominate the world, proceeded to 
carry the plan out ^^^thout regard either to the sacred obli- 
gations of treaty or the long-established practices and long- 
cherished principles of international action and honor; w^hich 
chose its owti time for the war; delivered its blow fiercely 
and suddenly; stopped at no barrier either of law or of 
mercy; swept a whole continent within the tide of blood — 
not the blood of soldiers only, but the blood of innocent 
women and children also and of the helpless poor; and now 
stands balked but not defeated, the enemy of four-fifths of 
the world. This power is not the German people. It is 
the ruthless master of the German people. It is no business 
of ours how that great people came under its control or sub- 
mitted with temporary zest to the domination of its purpose; 
but it is our business to see to it that the history of the rest 
of the world is no longer left to its handling. 

To deal with such a power by way of peace upon the plan 
proposed by His Holiness the Pope would, so far as we can 
see, involve a recuperation of its strength and a renewal of 



Aug. 27] PAPAL PROPOSITIONS OF PEACE 221 

its policy; would make it necessary to create a permanent 
hostile combination of nations against the German people 
who are its instruments; and would result in abandoning the 
riewbom Russia to the intrigue, the mar.ifold subtle inter- 
ference, and the certain counter-revolution which would be 
attempted by all the malign influences to which the German 
Government has of late accustomed the world. Can peace 
be based upon a restitution of its power or upon any word 
of honor it could pledge in a treaty of settlement and ac- 
commodation? 

Responsible statesmen must now everywhere see, if they 
never saw before, that no peace can rest securely upon politi- 
cal or economic restrictions meant to benefit some nations and 
cripple or embarrass others, upon vindictive action of any 
sort, or any kind of revenge or deliberate injury. The Amer- 
ican people have suffered intolerable wrongs at the hands of 
the Imperial German Government, but they desire no reprisal 
upon the German people who have themselves suffered all 
things in this war which they did not choose. They believe 
that peace should rest upon the rights of peoples, not the 
rights of Governments — the rights of peoples great or small, 
weak or powerful — their equal right to freedom and security 
and self-government and to a participation upon fair terms 
in the economic opportunities of the world, the German peo- 
ple of course included if they will accept equality and not seek 
domination. 

The test, therefore, of every plan of peace is this: Is it 
based upon the faith of all the peoples involved or merely 
upon the word of an ambitious and intriguing government 
on the one hand and of a group of free peoples on the other? 
This is a test which goes to the root of the matter; and it is 
the test which must be applied. 

The purposes of the United States in this war are known 
to the whole world, to every people to whom the truth has 
been permitted to come. They do not need to be stated 
again. We seek no material advantage of any kind. We 
believe that the intolerable wrongs done in this war by the 
furious and brutal power of the Imperial German Govern- 
ment ought to be repaired, but not at the expense of the sov- 
ereignty of any people — rather a vindication of the sover- 



222 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

eignty both of those that are weak and of those that are 
strong. Punitive damages, the dismemberment of empires, 
the establishment of selfish and exclusive economic leagues, 
we deem inexpedient and in the end worse than futile, no 
proper basis for a peace of any kind, least of all for an en- 
during peace. That must be based upon justice and fairness 
and the comm^on rights of mankind. 

We can not take the word of the present rulers of Ger- 
many as a guaranty of anything that is to endure, unless 
explicitly supported by such consclusive evidence of the will 
and purpose of the German people themselves as the other 
peoples of the world would be justified in accepting. With- 
out such guaranties treaties of settlement, agreements for 
disarmament, covenants to set up arbitration in the place of 
force, territorial adjustments, reconstitutions of small na- 
tions, if made with the German Government, no man, no 
nation could nov/ depend on. We must await some new evi- 
dence of the purposes of the great peoples of the Central 
Powers. God grant it may be given soon and in a way to 
restore the confidence of all peoples everyw^here in the faith 
of nations and the possibility of a covenanted peace. 

White House Pamphlet, 



69. TO THE SOLDIERS OF THE NATIONAL ARMY 

(September 3, 191 7) 
Public Message to the Drafted Men 

You are undertaking a great duty. The heart of the whole 
country is with you. 

Everything that you do will be watched with the deepest 
interest and with the deepest solicitude, not only by those 
who are near and dear to you, but by the whole nation 
besides. For this great war draws us all together, makes 
us all comrades and brothers, as all true Americans felt 
themselves to be when we first made good our national in- 
dependence. 

The eyes of all the world will be upon you, because you 



Sept. 3] TO SOLDIERS OF THE NATIONAL ARMY 223 

are in some special sense the soldiers of freedom. Let it be 
your pride, therefore, to show all men everywhere not only 
what good soldiers you are, but also what good men you 
are, keeping yourselves fit and straight in everything and 
pure and clean through and through. 

Let us set for ourselves a standard so high that it will 
be a glory to live up to it, and then let us live up to it and 
add a new laurel to the cro\Am of America. 

My affectionate confidence goes with you in every battle 
and every test. God keep and guide you! 

New York Times, Sept. 4, 19 17. 

70. THE JUNIOR RED CROSS 

(September 15, 19 17) 

Proclamation to the School Children of the United 

States 

The President of the United States is also President of 
the American Red Cross. It is from these offices joined in 
one that I write you a word of greeting at this time, when so 
many of you are beginning the school year. 

The American Red Cross has just prepared a junior mem- 
bership with school activities, in which every pupil in the 
United States can find a chance to serve our country. The 
school is the natural centre of your life. Through it you can 
best work in the great cause of freedom to which we have all 
pledged ourselves. 

Our junior Red Cross will bring to you opporttmities of 
service to your community and to other communities all over 
the world and guide your service with high and religious 
ideals. It will teach you how to save in order that suffering 
children elsewhere may have the chance to live. It will teach 
you how to prepare some of the supplies which wounded sol- 
diers and homeless families lack. It will send to you through 
the Red Cross bulletins the thrilling stories of relief and 
rescue. And, best of all, more perfectly than through any 
of your other school lessons, you will learn by doing those 
kind things under your teacher's direction to be the fu- 



2 24 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

ture good citizens of this great country which we all love. 
^ And I commend to all school teachers in the country the 
simple plan which the American Red Cross has worked out 
to provide for your cooperation, knowing as I do that school 
children will give their best ser^ace under the direct fniidance 
and instruction of their teachers. Is not this perhaps the 
chance for which you have been looldng to give your time 
and efforts in some measure to meet our national needs? 
New York Times, Sept. 19, 19 17, 



71. WOMEN AND THE SUFFRAGE 

(October 25, 191 7) 

Reply to a Delegation from the New York State 
Woman's Suffrage Party, at the White House 

It is with great pleasure that I receive you. I esteem it a 
privilege to do so. I know the difficulties which you have 
been laboring under in New York State, so clearly set forth 
by Mrs. Whitehouse, but in my judgment those difficulties 
cannot be used as an excuse by the leaders of any party or 
by the voters of any party for neglecting the question which 
you are pressing upon them. Because, after all, the whole 
world now is . witnessing a struggle betvv-een two ideals of 
government. It is a struggle w^hich goes deeper and touches 
more of the foundations of the organized life of men than 
any struggle that has ever taken place before, and no set- 
tlement of the questions that lie on the surface can satisfy 
a situation which requires that the questions which lie under- 
neath and at the foundation should also be settled and set- 
tled right. I am free to say that I think the question of 
woman suffrage is one of those questions which lie at the 
foundation. 

The world has witnessed a slow political reconstruction, 
and men have generally been obliged to be satisfied with 
the slowness of the process. In a sense it is wholesome that 
it should be slow, because then it is solid and sure. But I 
believe that this war is going so to quicken the convictions 



Oct. 25] WOMEN AND THE SUFFRAGE 225 

and the consciousness of mankind with regard to political 
questions that the speed of reconstruction will be greatly 
increased. And I believe that just because we are quickened 
by the questions of this war, we ought to be quickened to 
give this question of woman suffrage our immediate con- 
sideration. — 

As one of the spokesmen of a great party, I would be do- 
ing nothing less than obeying the mandates of that party 
if I gave my hearty support to the question of woman suf- 
frage which you represent, but I do not vrant to speak merely 
as one of the spokesmen of a party. I want to speak for my- 
self, and say that it seems to me that this is the time for 
the States of this Union to take this action. I perhaps may 
be touched a little too much by the traditions of our politics, 
traditions which lay such questions almost entirely upon the 
States, but I want to see communities declare themselves 
quickened at this time and show the consequence of the 
quickening. 

I think the whole country has appreciated the way in 
v\rhich the women have arisen to this great occasion. They 
not only have done what they have been asked to do, and 
done it with ardor and efficiency, but they have sho\vn a 
power to organize for doing things of their own initiative, 
which is quite a different thing, and a very much more diffi- 
cult thing, and I think the whole country has admired the 
spirit and the capacity and the vision of the women of the 
United States. 

It is almost absurd to say that the country depends upon 
the women for a large part of the inspirations of its life. 
That is too obvious to say; but it is now depending upon the 
women also for suggestions of service, w^hich have been ren- 
dered in abundance and with the distinction of originality. 
I, therefore, am very glad to add my voice to those which 
are urging the people of the great State of New York to set 
a great example by voting for woman suffrage. It would be 
a pleasure if I might utter that advice in their presence. 
Inasmuch as I am bound too close to my duties here to make 
that possible, I am glad to have the privilege to ask you to 
convey that message to them. 

It seems to me that this is a time of privilege. All our 



226 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

principles, all our hearts, all our purposes, are being searched; 
searched not only by our own consciences but searched by 
the world; and it is time for the people of the States of this 
country to show the world in what practical sense they have 
learned the lessons of democracy — that they are fighting for 
democracy because they believe it, and that there is no ap- 
plication of democracy which they do not believe in. 

I feel, therefore, that I am standing upon the firmest 
foundations of the age in bidding Godspeed to the cause 
which you represent and in expressing the ardent hope that 
the people of New York may realize the great occasion which 
faces them on Election Day and may respond to it in noble 
fashion. 

New York Times, Oct. 26, 191 7. 



72. LABOR AND THE WAR 

(November 12, 1917) 

Address to the American Federation of Labor Con- 
vention, AT Buffalo 

I esteem it a great privilege and a real honor to be thus 
admitted to your public counsels. WTien your executive com- 
mittee paid me the compliment of inviting me here I gladly 
accepted the invitation because it seems to me that this, above 
all other times in our history, is the time for common coun- 
sel, for the drawing together not only of the energies but 
of the minds of the Nation. I thought that it was a welcome 
opportunity for disclosing to you some of the thoughts that 
have been gathering in my mind during these last momentous 
months. * * * 

The war was started by Germany. Her authorities deny 
that they started it, but I am willing to let the statement I 
have just made await the verdict of history. And tlie thing 
that needs to be explained is why Germany started the war. 
Remember what the position of Germany in the world was — 
as enviable a position as any nation has ever occupied. The 
whole world stood at admiration of her wonderful intellectual 



Nov. 12] LABOR AND THE WAR 227 

and material achievements. All the intellectual men of 
the world went to school to her. As a university man I have 
been surrounded by men trained in Germany, men who had 
resorted to Germany because nowhere else could they get 
such thorough and searching training, particularly in the prin- 
ciples of science and the principles that underlie modem ma- 
terial achievement. Her men of science had made her 
industries perhaps the most competent industries of the 
world, and the label "Made in Germany" was a guarantee 
of good w^orkmanship and of sound material. She had access 
to all the markets of the world, and every other nation who 
traded in those markets feared Germany because of her effec- 
tive and almost irresistible competition. She had a "place 
in the sun." 

Why was she not satisfied? What more did she want? 
There was nothing in the world of peace that she did not 
already have and have in abundance. We boast of the ex- 
traordinary pace of American advancement. We show with 
pride the statistics of the increase of our industries and of the 
population of our cities. Well, those statistics did not match 
the recent statistics of Germany. Her old cities took on 
youth and grew faster than any American cities ever grew. 
Her old industries opened their eyes and saw a new world 
and went out for its conquest. And yet the authorities of 
Germany were not satisfied. 

You have one part of the answer to the question why she 
was not satisfied in her methods of competition. There is 
no important industry in Germany upon which the Govern- 
ment has not laid its hands, to direct it and, when necessity 
arose, control it; and you have only to ask any man whom 
you meet who is familiar with the conditions that prevailed 
before the war in the matter of national competition to find 
out the methods of competition which the German manufac- 
turers and exporters used under the patronage and support of 
the Government of Germany. You will find that they were 
the same sorts of competition that we have tried to prevent 
by law within our own borders. If they could not sell their 
goods cheaper than we could sell ours at a profit to themselves 
they could get a subsidy from the Government which made it 
possible to sell them cheaper anyhow, and the conditions of 



2 28 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

competition were thus controlled in large measure by the 
German Government itself. 

But that did not satisfy the German Government. All the 
while there was lying behind its thought and in its dreams 
of the future a political control which would enable it in the 
long run to dominate the labor and the industry of the world. 
They were not content with success by superior achievement ; 
they wanted success by authority. I suppose very few of 370U 
have thought much about the Berlin-to-Bagdad Railv/ay. 
The Berlin-Bagdad Railway was constructed in order to run 
the threat of force down the flank of the industrial under- 
takings of half a dozen other countries; so that when German 
competition came in it would not be resisted too far, because 
there was always the possibility of getting German armies 
into the heart of that country quicker than any other armies 
could be got there. 

Look at the map of Europe now! Germany is thrusting 
upon us again and again the discussion of peace talks, — about 
what? Talks about Belgium; talks about northern France; 
talks about Alsace-Lorraine. Well those are deeply interest- 
ing subjects to us and to them, but they are not the heart 
of the matter. Take the map and look at it. Germany has 
absolute control of Austria-Hungary, practical control of 
the Balkan States, control of Turkey, control of Asia Minor. 
I sav; a map in which the whole thing was printed in appro- 
priate black the other day, and the black stretched all the 
way from Hamburg to Bagdad — ^the bulk of German povver 
inserted into the heart of the world. If she can keep that, 
she has kept all that her dreams contemplated when the war 
began. If she can keep that, her power can disturb the world 
as long as she keeps it, always provided, for I feel bound to 
put this proviso in — always provided the present influences 
that control the German Government continue to control it. 
I believe that the spirit of freedom can get into the hearts of 
Germans and find as flne a welcome there as it can nnd in 
any other hearts, but the spirit of freedom does not suit the 
plans of the Pan-Germans. Power can not be used with 
concentrated force against free peoples if it is used by free 
people.- * * * 

While we are fighting for freedom we must see, among 



Nov. 12] LABOR AND THE WAR 229 

other things, that labor is free; and that means a number of 
interesting things. It means not only that we must do what 
we have declared our purpose to do, see that the conditions 
of labor are not rendered more onerous by the war, but also 
that we shall see to it that the instrumentalities by which the 
conditions of labor are improved are not blocked or checked. 
That we must do. That has been the matter about which I 
have taken pleasure in conferring from time to time with 
your president, Mr. Gompers; and if I may be permitted to 
do so, I vv'ant to express my admiration of his patriotic cour- 
age, his large vision, and his statesmanlike sense of what has 
to be done. I like to lay my mind alongside of a mind that 
knows how to pull in harness. The horses that kick over 
the traces will have to be put in corral. 

Now, to stand together means that nobody must interrupt 
the processes of our energy if the interruption can possibly 
be avoided without the absolute invasion of freedom. To put 
it concretely, that means this: Nobody has a right to stop 
the processes of labor until all the methods of conciliation and 
settlement have been exhausted. .. And I might as well say 
right here that I am not talking to you alone. You some- 
times stop the courses of labor, but there are others who do 
the same, and I believe I am speaking from my own experi- 
ence not only, but from the experience of others when I say 
that you are reasonable in a larger number of cases than the 
capitalists. I am not saying these things to them personally 
yet, because I have not had a chance, but they have to be 
said, not in an}'' spirit of criticism, but in order to clear the 
atmosphere and come down to business. Everybody on both 
sides has nov/ got to transact business, and a settlement is 
never impossible when both sides want to do the square and 
right thing. 

Moreover, a settlement is always hard to avoid when the 
parties can be brought face to face. I can differ from a man 
much more radically when he is not in the room than I can 
when he is in the room, because then the awkward thing is 
he can come back at me and answer what I say. It is always 
dangerous for a man to have the floor entirely to himself. 
Therefore, we must insist in every instance that the parties 
come into each other's presence and there discuss the issues 



230 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

between them, and not separately in places which have no 
communication with each other. I always like to remind 
myself of a delightful saying of an Englishman of the past 
generation, Charles Lamb. He stuttered a little bit, and once 
when he was with a group of friends he spoke very harshly 
of some man who was not present. One of his friends said: 
"Why, Charles, I didn't know that you knew so and so." 
"0-o-oh," he said, "I-I d-d-don't; I-I can't h-h-hate a m-m^ 
man I-I know." There is a great deal of human nature, of 
very pleasant human nature, in the saying. It is hard to 
hate a man you know. I may admit, parenthetically, that 
there are some politicians whose methods I do not at all 
believe in, but they are jolly good fellows, and if they only 
would not talk the wrong kind of politics to me, I would love 
to be with them. 

So it is all along the line, in serious matters and things less 
serious. We are all of the same clay and spirit, and w^e can 
get together if we desire to get together. Therefore, my coun- 
sel to you is this: Let us shov/ ourselves Americans by show- 
ing that we do not w^ant to go off in separate camps or groups 
by ourselves, but that we want to cooperate with all other 
classes and all other groups in the common enterprise which 
is to release the spirits of the world from bondage. I w^ould 
be willing to set 'that up as the final test of an American. 
That is the meaning of democracy. I have been very much 
distressed, my fellow citizens, by some of the things that have 
happened recently. The mob spirit is displaying itself nere 
and there in this country. I have no sympathy with what 
some men are saying, but 1 have no sympathy with the men 
who take their punishm.ent into their o\\ti hands; and I 
want to say to every man who does join such a mob that I 
do not recognize him as worthy of the free institutions of the 
United States. There are some organizations in this country 
whose object is anarchy and the destruction of law, but I 
would not meet their efforts by m.aking myself partner in de- 
stroying the law. I despise and hate their purposes as much 
as any man, but I respect the ancient processes of justice; 
and I would be too proud not to see them done justice, how^- 
ever wrong they are. * * * 

White House Pamphlet. 



Nov. 1 6] UNIVERSAL LOYALTY 231 

73. UNIVERSAL LOYALTY 

(November 16, 191 7) 

Telegram to the Northwest Loyalty Meetings, 
St. Paul 

Notliing could be more significant than your gathering to 
express the loyalty of the great Northwest. If it were pos- 
sible I should gladly be with you. You have come together 
as the representatives of that Western empire in which the 
sons of all sections of America and the stocks of all the na- 
tions of Europe have made the prairie and the forest the 
home of a new race and the temple of a new faith. 

The tim.e has come when that home must be protected and 
that faith affirmed in deeds. Sacrifice and service must come 
from every class, every profession, every party, every race, 
every creed, every section. This is not a banker's war or 
a farmer's war or a manufacturer's war or a laboring man's 
war — it is a war for every straight-out American whether our 
flag be his by birth or by adoption. 

We are to-day a Nation in arms, and we must fight and 
farm, mine and manufacture, conserve food and fuel, save 
and spend, to the one common purpose. It is to the great 
Northwest that the Nation looks, as once before in critical 
days, for that steadiness of purpose and firmness of deter- 
mination which shall see this struggle through to a decision 
that shall make the masters of Germany rue the day they 
unmasked their purpose and challenged our Republic. 

New York Times, Nov. 17, 191 7. 

74. SYMPATHY WITH THE BELGIANS 

(November 16, 191 7) 

Cablegram to King Albert of Belgium 

I take pleasure in extending to Your Majesty greetings of 
friendship and good will on this your fete day. 



232 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

For the people of the United States, I take this occasion 
to renew expressions of deep sympathy for the sufferings 
which Belgium has endured under the willful, cruel and bar- 
baric force of a disappointed Prussian autocracy. 

The people of the United States were never more in ear- 
nest than in their determination to prosecute to a successful 
conclusion this war against that power and to secure for the 
future obedience to the laws of nations and respect for the 
rights of humanity. 

New York Times, Nov. 17, 191 7. 



75. EXTENSION OF THE WAR TO AUSTRIA- 
HUNGARY 

(December 4, 19 17) 

Address to Congress 

* * * I shall not go back to debate the causes of the war. 
The intolerable wrongs done and planned against us by the 
sinister masters of Germany have long since become too 
grossly obvious and odious to every true American to need 
to be rehearsed. But I shall ask you to consider again and 
with a very grave scrutiny our objectives and the measures 
by which we mean to attain them; for the purpose of dis- 
cussion here in this place is action, and our action must move 
straight towards definite ends. Our object is, of course, to 
win the war; and we shall not slacken or suffer ourselves to 
be diverted until it is won. But it is vrorth Vvhile asking and 
answering the question, When shall we consider the war 
won? 

From one point of view it is not necessary to broach this 
fundamental matter. I do not doubt that the American 
people know what the war is about and what sort of an out- 
come they will regard as a realization of their'purpose in it. 
As a nation we are united in spirit and intention. I pay 
little heed to those who tell me otherwise. I hear the voices 
of dissent, — who does not? I hear the criticism and the 
clamour of the noisily thoughtless and troublesome. 1 also 



\ 
i 



Dec. 4] WAR WITH AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 233 

see men here and there fling themselves in impotent disloy- 
alty against the calm, indomitable power of the nation. I 
hear men debate peace who understand neither its nature nor 
the way in which we may attain it with uplifted eyes and 
unbroken spirits. But I know that none of these speaks for 
the nation. They do not touch the heart of anything. They 
may safely be left to strut their uneasy hour and be for- 
gotten. 

But from another point of view I believe that it is neces- 
sary to say plainly what we here at the seat of action consider 
the war to be for and what part we mean to play in the set- 
tlement of its searching issues. We are the spokesmen of the 
American people and they have a right to know whether their 
purpose is ours. They desire peace by the overcoming of 
evil, by the defeat once for all of the sinister forces that in- 
terrupt peace and render it impossible, and they wish to know 
how closely our thought runs with theirs and what action we 
propose. They are impatient with those who desire peace by 
any sort of compromise, — deeply and indignantly impatient, 
— but they will be equally impatient with us if we do not 
make it plain to them what our objectives are and what we 
are planning for in seeking to make conquest of peace by 
arms. 

I believe that I speak for them when I say two things: 
First, that this intolerable Thing of which the masters of 
Germany have shown us the ugly face, this menace of com- 
bined intrigue and force which we nov/ see so clearly as the 
German power, A Thing without conscience or honor or 
capacity for covenanted peace, must be crushed and, if it be 
not utterly brought to an end. at least shut out from the 
friendly intercourse of the nations; and, second, that when 
this Thing and its power are indeed defeated and the time 
comes that we can discuss peace, — when the German people 
have spokesmen whose word we can believe and when those 
spokesmen are ready in the name of their people to accept 
the common judgment of the nations as to what shall hence- 
forth be the bases of law and of covenant for the life of the 
world, — we shall be willing and glad to pay the full price for 
peace, and pay it ungrudgingly. We know what that price 
will be. It will be full, impartial justice, — justice done at 



234 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDEx\T WILSON [19 17 

every point and to every nation that the final settlement must 
affect, our enemies as well as our friends. 

You catch, with me, the voices of humanity that are in 
the air. They grow daily more audible, more articulate, more 
persuasive, and they come from the hearts of men every- 
where. They insist that the war shall not end in vindictive 
action of any kind; that no nation or people shall be robbed 
or punished because the irresponsible rulers of a single coun- 
try have themselves done deep and abominable wrong. It is 
this thought that has been expressed in the formula, "No an- 
nexations, no contributions, no punitive indemnities." Just 
because this crude formula expresses the instinctive judgment 
as to right of plain men everywhere it has been made diligent 
use of by the masters of German intrigue to lead the people 
of Russia astray — and the people of every other country 
their agents could reach, in order that a premature peace 
might be brought about before autocracy has been taught its 
final and convincing lesson, and the people of the world put 
in control of their own destinies. 

But the fact that a v/rong use has been made of a just 
idea is no reason why a right use should not be made of it. 
It ought to be brought under the patronage of its real friends. 
Let it be said again that autocracy must first be shown the 
utter futility of its claims to power or leadership in the mod- 
ern world. It is impossible to apply any standard of justice 
so long as such forces are unchecked and imdefeated as the 
present masters of Germany command. Not until that has 
been done can Right be set up as arbiter and peace-maker 
among the nations. But when that has been done, — as, God 
willing, it assuredly will be,— we must at last be free to do an 
unprecedented thing, and this is the time to avow our purpose 
to do it. We shall be free to base peace on generosity and 
justice, to the exclusion of all selfish claims to advantage on 
the part of the victors. 

Let there be no misunderstanding. Our present and im- 
mediate task is to win the war, and nothing shall turn us 
aside from it until it is accomplished. Every power and re- 
source we possess, whether of men, of money, or of materials, 
is being devoted and will continue to be devoted to that pur- 
pose until it is achieved. Those who desire to bring peace 



Dec. 4] WAR WITH AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 235 

about before that purpose is achieved I counsel to carry their 
advice elsewhere. We will not entertain it. We shall regard 
the war as won only when the German people say to us, 
through properly accredited representatives, that they are 
ready to agree to a settlement based upon justice and the 
reparation of the wrongs their rulers have done. They have 
done a wrong to Belgium which must be repaired. They have 
established a power over other lands and peoples than their 
own, — over the great Empire of Austria-Hungary, over hith- 
erto free Balkan states, over Turkey, and within Asia, — which 
must be relinquished. 

* * "^ The peace we make must remedy that wrong. It 
must deliver the once fair lands and happy peoples of Bel- 
gium and northern France from the Prussian conquest and 
the Prussian menace, but it must also deliver the peoples 
of Austria-Hungary, the peoples of the Balkans, and the 
peoples of Turkey, alike in Europe and in Asia, from the im- 
pudent and alien dominion of the Prussian military and com- 
mercial autocracy. 

We owe it, however, to ourselves to say that we do not 
wish in any way to impair or to rearrange the Austro-Hun- 
garian Empire. It is no affair of ours what they do with 
their ovm life, either industrially or politically. We do not 
purpose or desire to dictate to them in any way. We only 
desire to see that their affairs are left in their own hands, in 
all matters, great or small. W'e shall hope to secure for the 
peoples of the Balkan peninsula and for the people of the 
Turkish Empire the right and opportunity to make their own 
lives safe, their ov.n fortunes secure against oppression or 
injOstTce and from the dictation of foreign courts or parties. 
And our attitude and purpose v/ith regard to Germany her- 
self are of a like kind. We intend no wrong against the 
German Empire, no interference with her internal affairs. 
We should deem either the one or the other absolutely un- 
justifiable, absolutely contrary to the principles we have 
professed to live by and to hold most sacred throughout our 
life as a nation. 

The people of Germany are being told by the men whom 
they now permit to deceive them and to act as their masters 
that they are fighting for the very life and existence of their 



236 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

Empire, a war of desperate self-defense against deliberate 
aggression. Nothing could be more grossly or wantonly false, 
and we must seek by the utmost openness and candour as to 
our real aims to convince them of its falseness. We are in 
fact fighting for their emancipation from fear, along with our 
own, — from the fear as well as from the fact of unjust at- 
tack by neighbors or rivals or schemers after world empire. 
No one is threatening the existence or the independence or 
the peaceful enterprise of the German Empire. 

The worst that can happen to tlie detriment of the Ger- 
man people is this, that if they should still, after the war is 
over, continue to be obliged to live under ambitious and in- 
triguing masters interested to disturb the peace of the world, 
men or classes of men whom the other peoples of the world 
could not trust, it might be impossible to admit them to the 
partnership of nations which must henceforth guarantee the 
world's peace. That partnership must be a partnership of 
peoples, not a mere partnership of governments. It might 
be impossible, also, in such untoward circumstances, to admit 
Germany to the free economic intercourse which must inevi- 
tably spring out of the other partnerships of a real peace. 
But there would be no aggression in that; and such a situa- 
tion, inevitable because of distrust, would in the very nature 
of things sooner or later cure itself, by processes w^hich would 
assuredly set in. 

The wrongs, the very deep wrongs, committed in this war 
will have to be righted. That of course. But they cannot 
and must not be righted by the commission of similar wrongs 
against Germany and her allies. The world will not permit 
the com.mission of similar wrongs as a means of reparation 
and settlement. Statesmen must by this time have learned 
that the opinion of the v/orld is everywhere wide awake and 
fully comprehends the issues involved. No representative of 
any self -governed nation will dare disregard it by attempting 
any such covenants of selfishness and compromise as were 
entered into at the Congress of Vienna. The thought of the 
plain people here and everywhere throughout the world, the 
people who enjoy no privilege and have very simple and un- 
sophisticated standards of right and wrong, is the air all 
governments must henceforth breathe if they would live. It 



Dec. 4] WAR WITH AUSTRIA-HUNGARY 237 

is in the full disclosing light of that thought that all policies 
j must be conceived and executed in this midday hour of the 
world's life. German rulers have been able to upset the peace 
of the world only because the German people were not suf- 
fered under their tutelage to share the comradeship of the 
other peoples of the world either in thought or in purpose. 
They were allowed to have no opinion of their owti which 
might be set up as a rule of conduct for those v/ho exercised 
f authority over them. But the congress that concludes this 
war will feel the full strength of the tides that run now in the 
hearts and consciences of free men everywhere. Its con- 
clusions will run with those tides. * * * 

From every point of view, therefore, it has seemed to be my 
duty to 'speak these declarations of purpose, to add these 
specific interpretations to what I took the liberty of saying to 
the Senate in January. Our entrance into the war has not 
altered our attitude towards the settlement that must come 
when it is over. VvTien I said in January that the nations of 
the world were entitled not only to free pathways upon the 
sea but also to assured and unmolested access to those path- 
w^ays I was thinking, and I am thinking now, not of the 
smaller and weaker nations alone, which need our counte- 
nance and support, but also of the great and powerful nations, 
and of our present enemies as well as our present associates 
in the war. I was thinking, and am thinking now, of Austria 
herself, among the rest, as well as of Serbia and of Poland. 
Justice and equality of rights can be had only at a great 
price. We are seeking permanent, not temporary, founda- 
tions for the peace of the w^orld and must seek them candidly 
and fearlessly. As always, the right will prove to be the 
expedient. 

What shall we do, then, to push this great war of freedom 
and justice to its righteous conclusion? We must clear away 
with a thorough hand all impediments to success and we must 
make every adjustment of law that will facilitate the full and 
free use of our whole capacity and force as a fighting unit. 
^ One very embarrassing obstacle that stands in our way is 
that we are at war with Germany but not with her allies. 
I therefore very earnestly recommend that the Congress im- 
mediately declare the United States in a state of war with 



238 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1917 

Austria-Hungary. Does it seem strange to you that this 
should be the condusion of the argument I have just ad- 
dressed to you? It is not. It is in fact the inevitable logic 
of what I have said. Austria-Hungary is for the time being 
not her own mistress but simply the vassal of the German 
Govemm.ent. We must face the facts as they are and act 
upon them without sentiment in this stern business. The 
government of Austria-E^ungary is not acting upon its own 
initiative or in response to the wishes and feelings of its own 
peoples but as the instrument of another nation. We must 
meet its force with our own and regard the Central Powers 
as but one. The war can be successfully conducted in no 
other way. The same logic would lead also to a declaration 
of war against Turkey and Bulgaria. They also are the tools 
of Germany. But they are mere tools and do not yet stand 
in the direct path of our necessary action. We shall go 
wherever the necessities of this war carry us, but it seems 
to me that we should go only where immediate and practical 
considerations lead us and not heed any others. * * * 

White House Pamphlet. 



76. GOVERNMENT CONTROL OF RAILROADS 
(December 26, 19 17) 
Public Statement 

I have exercised the powers over the transportation sys- 
tems of the country which were granted me by the act of 
Congress last August because it has become imperatively 
necessary for me to do so. 

This is a war of resources no less than of men, perhaps 
even more than of men, and it is necessary for the complete 
mobilization of our resources that the transportation systems 
of the country should be organized and employed under a 
single authority and a simplified method of coordination 
which have not proved possible under private management 
and control. 

The Committee of Railway Executives who have been co- 



Dec. 26] GOVERNMENT AND RAILROADS 239 

operating with the Government in this all-important matter 
have done the utmost that it was possible for them to do; 
have done it with patriotic zeal and with great ability, but 
there were differences that they could neither escape nor neu- 
tralize. Complete unity of administration in the present cir- 
cumstances involves upon occasion and at many points a 
serious dislocation of earnings, and the committee was, of 
course, without power or authority to rearrange changes or 
effect proper compensations and adjustments of earnings. 
Several roads which were willingly and with admirable public 
spirit accepting the orders of the committee have already 
suffered from these circumstances, and should not be required 
to suffer further. In mere fairness to them the full authority 
of the Government must be substituted. The Government 
itself will thereby gain an immense increase of efficiency in 
the conduct of the war and of the innumerable activities 
upon which its successful conduct depends. 

The public interest must be first served, and, in addition, 
the financial interests of the Government and the financial in- 
terests of the railways must be brought under a common 
direction. The financial operations of the railways need not 
then interfere with the borrowings of the Government, and 
they themselves can be conducted at a great advantage. In- 
vestors in railway securities may rest assured that their rights 
and interests will be as scrupulously looked after by the* 
Government as they could be by the directors of the several 
raihvay systems. 

Immediately upon the reassembling of Congress I shall 
recommend that these definite guarantees be given. First, of 
course, that the railway properties will be maintained during 
the period of Federal control in as good repair and as com- 
plete equipment as when taken over by the Government, and, 
second, that the roads shall receive a net operating income 
equal in each case to the average net income of the three 
years preceding June 30, 191 7; and I am entirely confident 
that the Congress v/ill be disposed in this case, as in others, 
to see that justice is done and full security assured to the 
owners and creditors of the great systems which the Gov- 
ernment must now use under its own direction or else suffer 
serious embarrassment. 



240 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [19 17 

The Secretary of War and I are agreed that, all the cir- 
cumstances being taken into consideration, the best results 
can be obtained under the immediate executive direction of 
the Hon. William G. McAdoo, whose practical experience pe- 
culiarly fits him for the service and whose authority as 
Secretary of the Treasury will enable him to coordinate as 
no other man could, the many financial interests which will 
be involved and which might, unless systematically directed, 
suffer very embarrassing entanglements. 

The Government of the United States is the only great 
Government now engaged in the war which has not already 
assumed control of this sort. It was thought to be in the 
spirit of American institutions to attempt to do everything 
that was necessary through private management, and if zeal 
and ability and patriotic motive could have accomplished 
the necessary unification of administration, it would certainly 
have been accomplished; but no zeal or ability could over- 
come insuperable obstacles and I have deemed it my duty 
to recognize that fact in all candor, now that it is demon- 
strated, and to use without reserve the great authority re- 
posed in me. A great national necessity dictated the action, 
and I was therefore not at liberty to abstain from it. 

New York Times, Dec. 27, 19 17. 



YEAR 1918 

77. ORGANIZATION FOR THE WAR 

(January 4, 19 18) 
Address to Congress 

I have asked the privilege of addressing you in order to 
report to you that on the twenty-eighth of December last, 
during the recess of the Congress, acting through the Secre- 
tary of War and under the authority conferred upon me by 
the Act of Congress approved August 29, 19 16, I took pos- 
session and assumed control of the railway lines of the coun- 
try and the systems of water transportation under their con- 
trol. This step seemed to be imperatively necessary in the 
interest of the public welfare, in the presence of the great 
tasks of war with which we are now dealing. As our own 
experience develops difficulties and makes it clear what they 
are, I have deemed it my duty to remove those difficulties 
wherever I have the legal power to do so. To assume control 
of the vast railway systems of the country is, I realize, a very 
great responsibility, but to fail to do so in the existing cir- 
cumstances would have been a much greater. I assumed the 
less responsibility rather than the v;eightier. 

I am sure that I am speaking the mind of all thoughtful 
Americans when I say that it is our duty as the representa- 
tives of the nation to do everything that it is necessary to do 
to secure the complete mobilization of the whole resources of 
America by as rapid and effective means as can be found. 
Transportation supplies all the arteries of mobilization. Un- 
less it be under a single and unified direction, the whole 
process of the nation's action is embarrassed. 

It was in the true spirit of America, and it was right, that 
241 



242 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

we should first try to effect the necessary unification under 
the voluntary action of those vvho were in charge of the great 
railway properties; and we did try it. The directors of the 
railways responded to the need promptly and generously. 
The group of railway executives who were charged with the 
task of actual coordination and general direction performed 
their difficult duties with patriotic zeal and marked ability, 
as was to have been expected, and did, I believe, everything 
that it was possible for them to do in the circumstances. If 
I have taken the task out of their hands, it has not been 
because of any dereliction or failure on their part but only 
because there vv'ere some things which the Government can 
do and private management cannot. We shall continue to 
value m-ost highly the advice and assistance of these gentle- 
men and I am sure we shall not find them withholding it. 

It had become unmistakably plain that only under gov- 
ernment administration can the entire equipment of the 
several systems of transportation be fully and unreservedly 
thrown into a common service Vvithout injurious discrimina- 
tion against particular properties. Only under government 
administration can an absolutely unrestricted and unembar- 
rassed common use be made of all tracks, terminals, terminal 
facilities and equipment of every kind. Only under that 
authority can new terminals be constructed and developed 
without regard to the requirements or limitations of particular 
roads. But under government administration all these things 
w^ill be possible, — not instantly, but as fast as practical dif- 
fulties, which cannot be merely conjured away, give way be- 
fore the new management. 

The common administration will be carried out with as 
little disturbance of the present operating organizations and 
personnel of the railways as possible. Nothing will be altered 
or disturbed which it is not necessary to disturb. We are 
serving the public interest and safeguarding the public safety, 
but we are also regardful of the interest of those by whom 
these great properties are owned and glad to avail ourselves 
of the experience and trained ability of those who have been 
managing them. It is necessary that the transportation of 
troops and of war materials, of food and of fuel, and of 
everything that is necessary for the full mobilization of the 



Jan. 4] ORGANIZATION FOR THE WAR 243 j 

energies and resources of the country, should be first con- ' 
sidered, but it is clearly in the public interest also that the , 
ordinary activities and the normal industrial and commercial 
life of the country should be interfered with and dislocated , 
as little as possible, and the public may rest assured that the • 
interest and convenience of the private shipper will be as ■ 
carefully served and safeguarded as it is possible to serve and 
safegard it in the present extraordinary circumstances. 

While the present authority of the Executive suffices for all j 
purposes of administration, and while of course all private j 
interests must for the present give way to the public neces- I 
sity, it is, I am sure you will agree with me, right and neces- | 
sary that the owners and creditors of the railways, the hold- j 
ers of their stocks and bonds, should receive from the Govern- 
ment an unqualified guarantee that their properties will be 
maintained throughout the period of federal control in as • 
good repair and as complete equipment as at present, and that I 
the several roads will receive under federal management such \ 
compensation as is equitable and just alike to their owners 1 
and to the general public. I would suggest the average net i 
railway operating income of the three years ending June 30, 
191 7. I earnestly recommend that these guarantees be given j 
by appropriate legislation, and given as promptly as circum- 
stances permit. 

I need not point out the essential justice of such guarantees 
and their great influence and significance as elements in the 
present financial and industrial situation of the country. In- 
deed, one of the strong arguments for assuming control of 
the railroads at this time is the financial argument. It is 
necessary that the values of raihvay securities should be 
justly and fairly protected and that the large financial oper- 
ations every year necessary in connection with the mainte- 
nance, operation and development of the roads should, 
during the period of the war, be wisely related to the financial 
operations of the Government. Our first duty is, of course, 
to conserve the common interest and the common safety and 
to make certain that nothing stands in the way of the suc- 
cessful prosecution of the great war for liberty and justice, 
but it is also an obligation of public conscience and of public 
honor that the private interests we disturb should be kept 



244 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 ; 

safe from unjust injury, and it is of the utmost consequence j 

to the Government itself that all great financial operations ) 

should be stabilized and coordinated with the financial oper- 1 

ations of the Government. No borrowing should run athwart ^ 

the borromngs of the federal treasury, and no fundamental j 

industrial values should anywhere be unnecessarily impaired. ' 

In the hands of many thousands of small investors in the \ 
country, as well as in national banks, in insurance companies, 

in savings banks, in trust companies, in financial agencies of j 

every kind, railway securities, the sum total of which runs ! 

up to some ten or eleven thousand millions, constitute a vital \ 
part of the structure of credit, and the unquestioned solidity 
of that structure must be maintained. ^ * * 

White House Pamphlet. 



78. FOURTEEN CONDITIONS OF PEACE 

(January 8, 19 18) 

Address to Congress 

Once more, as repeatedly before, the spokesmen of the 
Central Empires have indicated their desire to discuss the 
objects of the war and the possible bases of a general peace. 
Parleys have been in progress at Brest-Litovsk between Rus- 
sian representatives and representatives of the Central Pow- 
ers to which the attention of all the belligerents has been 
invited for the purpose of ascertaining whether it may be 
possible to extend these parleys into a general conference 
with regard to terms of peace and settlement. The Russian 
representatives presented not only a perfectly definite state- 
ment of the principles upon which they would be willing to 
conclude peace but also an equally definite programme of 
the concrete application of those principles. The represen- 
tatives of the Central Powers, on their part, presented an 
outline of settlement which, if much less definite, seemed 
susceptible of liberal interpretation until their specific pro- 
gramme of practical terms was added. That programme pro- 
posed no concessions at all either to the sovereignty of Russia 



Jan. 81 FOURTEEN CONDITIONS OF PEACE 245 

or to the preferences of the populations with whose fortunes 
it dealt, but meant, in a word, that the Central Empires were 
to keep every foot of territory their armed forces had occu- 
pied, — every province, every city, every point of vantage, — 
as a permanent addition to their territories and thei^ power. 
It is a reasonable conjecture that the general principles of 
settlement which they at first suggested originated with the 
more liberal statesmen of Germany and Austria, the men who 
have begun to feel the force of their own peoples' thought and 
purpose, while the concrete terms of actual settlement came 
from the military leaders who have no thought but to keep 
what they have got. The negotiations have been broken off. 
The Russian representatives were sincere and in earnest. 
They cannot entertain such proposals of conquest and domi- 
nation. 

The whole incident is full of significance. It is also full 
of perplexity. With v/hom are the Russian representatives 
dealing? For whom are the representatives of the Central 
Empires speaking? Are they speaking for the majorities of 
their respective parliaments or for the minority parties, that 
military and imperialistic minority w^hich has so far domi- 
nated their whole policy and controlled the affairs of Turkey 
and of the Balkan states v;hich have felt obliged to become 
their associates in this war? The Russian representatives 
have insisted, very justly, very wisely, and in the true spirit 
of modern democracy, that the conferences they have been 
holding with the Teutonic and Turkish statesmen should be 
held within open, not closed, doors, and all the w/orld has 
been audience, as w^as desired. To v^^hom have w^e been 
listening, then? To those w^ho speak the spirit and intention 
of the Resolutions of the German Reichstag of the ninth of 
July last, the spirit and intention of the liberal leaders and 
parties of Germany, or to those who resist and defy that 
spirit and intention and insist upon conquest and subjuga- 
tion? Or are we listening, in fact, to both, unreconciled and 
in open and hopeless contradiction? These are very serious 
and pregnant questions. Upon the answer to them, depends 
the peace of the world. 

But, whatever the results cf the parleys at Brest-Litovsk, 
whatever the confusions of counsel and of purpose in the ut- 



246 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

terances of the spokesmen of the Central Empires, they have 
again attempted to acquaint the world with their objects in 
the war and have again challenged their adversaries to say 
what their objects are and what sort of settlement they 
would deem just and satisfactory. There is no good reason 
why that challenge should not be responded to, and responded 
to with the utmost candor. We did not wait for it. Not 
once, but again and again, we have laid our whole thought 
and purpose before the world, not in general terms only, but 
each time with sufficient definition to make it clear what sort 
of definitive terms of settlement must necessarily spring out 
of them. Within the last week Mr. Lloyd George has spoken 
with admirable candor and in admirable spirit for the people 
and Government of Great Britain. There is no confusion of 
counsel among the adversaries of the Central Powers, no un- 
certainty of principle, no vagueness of detail. The only 
secrecy of counsel,' the only lack of fearless frankness, the 
only failure to make definite statement of the objects of the 
war, lies with Germany and her Allies. The issues of life 
and death hang upon these definitions. No statesman who 
has the least conception of his responsibility ought for a mo- 
ment to permit himself to continue this tragical and appall- 
ing outpouring of blood and treasure unless he is sure beyond 
a peradventure that the objects of the vital sacrifice are part 
and parcel of the very life of Society and that the people 
for whom he speaks think them right and imperative as he 
does. 

There is, moreover, a voice calling for these definitions of 
principle and of purpose which is, it seems to me, more 
thrilling and more com.pelling than any of the many moving 
voices with which the troubled air of the world is filled. It 
is the voice of the Russian people. They are prostrate and 
all but helpless, it would seem, before the grim power of 
Germany, which has hitherto known no relenting and no 
pity. Their power, apparently, is shattered. And yet their 
soul is not subservient. They will not yield either in principle 
or in action. Their conception of what is right, of what it is 
humane and honorable for them to accept, has been stated 
with a frankness, a largeness of view, a generosity of spirit, 
and a universal human sympathy which must challenge the 



Jan. 8] FOURTEEN CONDITIONS OF PEACE 247 

admiration of every friend of mankind; and the}' have re- 
fused to compound their ideals or desert others that they 
themselves may be safe. They call to us to say what it is 
that we desire, in what, if in anything, our purpose and our 
spirit differ from theirs; and I believe that the people of the 
United States would wish me to respond, with utter simplicity 
and frankness. Whether their present leaders believe it or 
not, it is our heartfelt desire and hope that some way may be 
opened whereby we may be privileged to assist the people of 
Russia to attain their utmost hope of liberty and ordered 
peace. 

It will be our wish and purpose that the processes of peace, 
when they are begun, shall be absolutely open and that they 
shall involve and permit henceforth no secret understandings 
of any kind. The day of conquest and aggrandizement is 
gone by; so is also the day of secret covenants entered into 
in the interest of particular governments and likely at some 
unlooked-for moment to upset the peace of the w^orld. It is 
this happy fact, now clear to the view of every public man 
whose thoughts do not still linger in an age that is dead and 
gone, which makes it possible for every nation whose pur- 
poses are consistent with justice and the peace of the world 
to avow now or at any time the objects it has in xiew. 

We entered this war because violations of right had oc- 
curred which touched us to the quick and made the life of our 
own people impossible unless they were corrected and the 
world secured once for all against their recurrence. UTiat 
we demand in this war, therefore, is nothing peculiar to our- 
selves. It is that the world be made fit and safe to live in; 
and particularly that it be made safe for every peace-loving 
nation v/hich, like our owm, wishes to live its owm life, deter- 
mine its owTi institutions, be assured of justice and fair 
dealing by the other peoples of the world as against force and 
selfish aggression. All the peoples of the w^orld are in effect 
partners in this interest, and for our own part v;e see very 
clearly that unless justice be ^one to others it will not be done 
to us. The programme of the world's peace, therefore, is 
our programme; and that programme, the only possible pro- 
gramme, as we see it, is this: 

I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which 



248 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON 

there shall be no private international understandings of any 
kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the 
public view. 

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside 
territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the 
seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action 
for the enforcement of international covenants. 

III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic bar- 
riers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions 
among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating 
themselves for its maintenance. 

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national 
armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent w^ith 
domestic safety. 

V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjust- 
ment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance 
of the principle that in determining all such questions of 
sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must 
have equal weight with the equitable claims of the govern- 
ment whose title is to be determined. 

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a 
settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the 
best and freest cooperation of the other nations of the w^orld 
in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed op- 
portunity for the independent determination of her own 
political development and national policy and assure her of a 
sincere welcome into the society of free nations under insti- 
tutions of her own choosing; and, more than a w^elcome, 
assistance also of every kind that she may need and may 
herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister 
nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their 
good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished 
from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish 
sympathy. 

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evac- 
uated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sov- 
ereignty which she enjoys in common wath all other free 
nations. Xo other single act will serve as this will serve to 
restore confidence among the nations in the laws which the}' 
have themselves set and determined for the government of 



Jan. 8 I FOURTEEN CONDITIONS OF PEACE 249 

their relations with one another. Without this heahng act 
the whole structure and validity of international law is for- 
ever impaired. 

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded 
portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia 
in 18 7 1 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled 
the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be 
righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure 
in the interest of all. 

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be 
effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality. 

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among 
the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be 
accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development. 

XI. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evac- 
uated ; occupied territories restored ; Serbia accorded free and 
secure access to the sea; and the relations of the several 
Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel 
along historically established lines of allegiance and nation- 
alit}"; and international guarantees of the political and eco- 
nomic independence and territorial integrity of the several 
Balkan states should be entered into. 

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Em- 
pire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other 
nationalities which are nov\' under Turkish rule should be 
assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely un- 
molested opportunity of autonomous development, and the 
Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage 
to the ships and commerce of all nations under international 
guarantees. 

XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected 
which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably 
Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure 
access to the sea, and whose political and economic inde- 
pendence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by 
international covenant. 

XIV. A general association of nations must be formed 
under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual 
guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity 
to great and small states alike. 



250 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

In regard to these essential rectifications of wrong and 
assertions of right we feel ourselves to be intimate partners 
of all the governments and peoples associated together against 
the Imperialists. We cannot be separated in interest or di- 
vided in purpose. We stand together until the end. 

For such arrangements and covenants we are willing to 
fight and to continue to fight until they are achieved; but 
only because we wish the right to prevail and desire a just 
and stable peace such as can be secured only by removing 
the chief provocations to war, which this programme does 
remove. We have no jealousy of German greatness, and 
there is nothing in this programme that impairs it. We 
grudge her no achievement or distinction of learning or of 
pacific enterprise such as have made her record very bright 
and very enviable. We do not wish to injure her or to block 
in any way her legitimate influence or power. We do not 
wish to fight her either with arms or with hostile arrangements 
of trade if she is willing to associate herself with us and the 
other peace-loving nations of the world in covenants of jus- 
tice and law and fair dealing. We wish her only to accept 
a place of equality among the peoples of the world,- — the new 
world in which we now live, — instead of a place of mastery. 

Neither do we presume to suggest to her any alteration or 
modification of her institutions. But it is necessary, we must 
frankly say, and necessary as a preliminary to any intelli- 
gent dealings with her on our part, that we should know 
whom her spokesmen speak for when they speak to us, 
whether for the Reichstag majority or for the military party 
and the men whose creed is imperial domination. 

We have spoken now, surely, in terms too concrete to 
admit of any further doubt or question. An evident prin- 
ciple runs through the v;hole programme I have outlined. It 
is the principle of justice to all peoples and nationalities, and 
their right to live on equal terms of liberty and safety with 
one another, whether they be strong or weak. Unless this 
principle be made its foundation no part of the structure of 
international justice can stand. The people of the United 
States could act upon no other principle; and to the vindi- 
cation of this principle they are ready to devote their lives, 
their honor, and everything that they jx)ssess. The moral 



Jan. 8] FOURTEEN CONDITIONS OF PEACE 251 

climax of this the culminating and final war for human liberty 
has come, and they are ready to put their own strength, their 
own highest purpose, their ovm integrity and devotion to the 
test. 

White House Pamphlet. 



79. THE FARMERS' PATRIOTISM 

(January 31, 1918) 

Message to the Farmers' Conference at Urbana, 
Illinois 

I am very sorry indeed that I can not be present in person 
at the Urbana conference. I should like to enjoy the bene- 
fit of the inspiration and exchange of counsel which I know 
I should obtain, but in the circumstances it has seemed im- 
possible for m.e to be present, and therefore I can only send 
you a very earnest message expressing my interest and the 
thoughts which such a conference must bring prominently 
into every mind. 

I need not tell you, for I am sure you realize as keenly as 
I do, that we are as a Nation in the presence of a great task 
which demands supreme sacrifice and endeavor of every one 
of us. We can give everything that is needed with the 
greater willingness, and even satisfaction, because the object 
of the war in which we are engaged is the greatest that free 
men have ever undertaken. It is to prevent the life of the 
world from being determined and the fortunes of men every- 
where affected by small groups of military masters, who seek 
their ov^ti interest and the selfish dominion throughout the 
world of the Governments they unhappily for the moment 
control. You will not need to be convinced that it was neces- 
sary for us as a free people to take part in this war. It had 
raised its evil hand against us. The rulers of Germany had 
sought to exercise their pov/er in such a way as to shut off 
our economic life so far as our intercourse v/ith Europe was 
concerned, and to confine our people within the Western 
Hemisphere while they accomplished purposes which would 



252 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

have permanently impaired and impeded every process of 
our national life and have put the fortunes of America at 
the mercy of the Imperial Government of Germany. 

This was no threat. It had become a reality. Their -hand 
of violence had been laid upon our own people and our own 
property in flagrant violation not only of justice but of the 
well-recognized and long-standing covenants of international 
law and treaty. We are fighting, therefore, as truly for the 
liberty and self-government of the United States as if the 
war of our ovv'n Revolution had to be fought over again; 
and every man in every business in the United States must 
know by this time that his whole future fortune lies in the 
balance. Our national life and our whole economic develop- 
ment will pass under the sinister influences of foreign control 
if we do not Vvin. We must win, therefore, and we shall win. 
I need not ask you to pledge your lives and fortunes with 
those of the rest of the Nation to the accomplishment of that 
great end. 

You will realize, as I think statesmen on both sides of the 
water realize, that the culminating crisis of the struggle has 
come and that the achievements of this year on the one side 
or the other must determine the issue. It has turned out 
that the forces that fight for freedom, the freedom of men 
all over the world as well as our own, depend upon us in an 
extraordinary and unexpected degree for sustenance, for the 
supply of the materials by w^hich men are to live and to fight, 
and it will be our glory when the war is over that w^e have 
supplied those m.aterials and supplied them abundantly, and 
it will be all the -more glory because in supplying them we 
have made our supreme effort and sacrifice. 

In the field of agriculture we have agencies and instrumen- 
talities, fortunately, such as no other government in the world 
can show. The Department of ^Agriculture is undoubtedly 
the greatest practical and scientific agricultural organization 
in the world. Its total annual budget of $46,000,000 has 
been increased during the last four years more than 72 per 
cent. It has a staff of 18,000, including a large number of 
highly trained experts, and alongside of it stands the unique 
land-grant colleges, which are without example elsewhere, 
and the 69 State and Federal experiment stations. These 



Jan. 31 ] THE FARMERS' PATRIOTISM 253 

colleges and experiment stations have a total endowment of 
plant and equipment of $172,000,000 and an income of more 
than $35,000,000, \vith 10,271 teachers, a resident student 
body of 125,000, and a vast additional number receiving 
instruction at their homes. County agents, joint officers of 
the Department of Agriculture and of the colleges, are every- 
where cooperating with the farmers and assisting them. The 
number of extension workers under the Smith-Lever Act and 
under the recent emergency legislation has grown to. 5,500 
men and women working regularly in the various communi- 
ties and taking to the farmer the latest scientific and practi- 
cal information. 

Alongside these great public agencies stand the very effec- 
tive voluntary organizations among the farmers themselves 
which are more and more learning the best methods of co- 
operation and the best methods of putting to practical use the 
assistance derived from governmental sources. Tho banking 
legislation of the last two or three years has given the farmers 
access to the great lendable capital of the country, and it 
has become the duty both of the men in charge of the Fed- 
eral Reserve Banking System and of the Farm Loan Banking 
System to see to it that the farmers obtain the credit, both 
short term and long term, to which they are not only entitled 
but which it is imperatively necessary should be extended to 
them if the present tasks of the country are to be adequately 
performed. Both by direct purchase of nitrates and by the 
establishment of plants to produce nitrates the Government 
is doing its utmost to assist in the problem of fertilization. 
The Department of Agriculture and other agencies are ac- 
tively assisting the farmers to locate, safeguard, and secure 
at cost an adequate supply of sound seed. The department 
has $2,500,000 available for this purpose now and has asked 
the Congress for $6,000,000 more. 

The labor problem is one of great difficulty, and some of 
the best agencies of the Nation are addressing them.selves to 
the task of solving it, so far as it is possible to solve it. 
Farmers have not been exempted from the draft. I know 
that they would not wish to be. I take it for granted they 
would not wish to be put in a class by themselves in this 
respect. But the attention of the War Department has been 



_54 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

very seriously centered upon the task of interfering with the 
labor of the farms as little as possible, and under the new 
draft regulations I believe that the farmers of the country 
will find that their supply of labor is very much less seriously 
dra\^'n upon than it was under the first and initial draft, 
made before we had our present full experience in these per- 
plexing matters. The supply of labor in all industries is a 
matter we must look to and are looking to with diligent care. 

And let me say that the situation of the agencies I have 
enumerated has been responded to by the farmers in splendid 
fashion. I dare say that you are aware that the farmers of 
this country are as efficient as any other farmers in the world. 
They do not produce more per acre than the farmers in 
Europe. It is not necessary that they should do so. It 
would perhaps be bad economy for them to attempt it. But 
they do produce by two to three or four times more per man, 
per unit of labor and capital, than the farmers of any Euro- 
pean country. They are more alert and use more labor- 
saving devices than any other farmers in the world. And 
their response to the demands of the present emergency has 
been in every way remarkable. Last spring their planting 
exceeded by 12,000,000 acres the largest planting of any 
previous year, and the yields from the crops were record- 
breaking 3delds. In the fall of 19 17 a wheat acreage of 
42,170,000 was planted, which w^as 1,000,000 larger than for 
any preceding year, 3,000,000 greater than the next largest, 
and 7,000,000 greater than the preceding five-year average. 

But I ought to say to you that it is not only necessary 
that these achievements should be repeated, but that they 
should be exceeded. I know what this advice involves. It 
involves not only labor but sacrifice, the painstaking applica- 
tion of every bit of scientific knowledge and every tested 
practice that is available. It means the utmost economy, 
even to the point where the pinch comes. It means the kind 
of concentration and self-sacrifice which is involved in the 
field of battle itself, where the object always loom.s greater 
than the individual. And yet the Government will help and 
help in every way that is possible. The impression which 
prevails in some quarters that while the Government has 
sought to fix the prices of foodstuffs it has not sought to fix 



Jan.3i] THE FARMERS' PATRIOTISM 255 

other prices which determine the expenses of the farmer is a 
mistaken one. As a matter of fact, the Government has ac- 
tively and successfully regulated the prices of many funda- 
mental materials underlying all the industries of the country, 
and has regulated them, not only for the purchases of the 
Government, but also for the purchases of the general public, 
and I have every reason to believe that the Congress will 
extend the powers of the Government in this important and 
even essential matter, so that the tendency to profiteering, 
■which is showing itself in too many quarters, may be effec- 
tively checked. In fixing the prices of foodstuffs the 
Government has sincerely tried to keep the interests of the 
farmer as much in mind as the interests of the communities 
which are to be served, but it is serving mankind as w^ell as 
the farmer, and everything in these times of war takes on the 
rigid aspect of duty. 

I will not appeal to you to continue and renew and increase 
3'our efforts. I do not believe that it is necessary to do so. 
I believe that you will do it without any w^ord or appeal from 
me, because you understand as well as I do the needs and 
opportunities of this great hour when the fortunes of mankind 
everywhere seem about to be determined and when America 
has the greatest opportunity she has ever had to make good 
her own freedom and in making it good to lend a helping hand 
to men struggling for their freedom everywhere. You remem- 
ber that it was farmers from w^hom came the first shots at 
Lexington, that set aflame the revolution that made America 
free. I hope and believe that the farmers of America will 
willingly and conspicuously stand by to win this w-ar also. 

The toil, the intelligence, the energy, the foresight, the self- 
sacrifice, and devotion of the farmers of America will, I 
believe, bring to a triumphant conclusion this great last war 
for the emancipation of men from the control of arbitrary 
government and the selfishness of class legislation and control, 
and then, when the end has come, w^e may look each other 
in the face and be glad that we are Americans and have had 
the privilege to play such a part. 

White House Pamphlet, 



256 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

80. HONOR TO THE RED. CROSS 

(May 18, 1918) 

Address to the Public Meeting in New York, Opening 
A Campaign for the Second Red Cross Fund 

I should be very sorry to think that Mr. Davison in any 
degree curtailed his exceedingly interesting speech for fear 
that he was postponing mine, because I am sure you listened 
with the same intent and intimate interest with which I lis- 
tened to the extraordinarily vivid account he gave of the 
things which he had realized because he had come in contact 
with them on the other side of the water. We compassed 
them with our imagination. He compassed them in his per- 
sonal experience. 

I am not come here to-night to review for you the work of 
the Red Cross. I am not competent to do so, because I have 
not had the time or the opportunity to follow it in detail. I 
have come here simply to say a few w^ords to you as to what 
it all seems to me to mean. 

It means a great deal. There are two duties with which 
we are face to face. The first duty is to win the war. The 
second duty, that goes hand in hand with it, is to win it 
greatly and worthily, showing the real quality of our power 
not only, but the real quality of our purpose and of ourselves. 
Of course, the first duty, the duty that we must keep in the 
foreground of our thought until it is accomplished, is to win 
the war. I have heard gentlemen recently say that v.-e must 
get five million men ready. WTiy limit it to five million? I 
have asked the Congress of the United States to name no 
limit, because the Congress intends, I am sure, as we all in- 
tend, that every ship that can carry men or supplies shall go 
laden upon every voyage with every man and every supply 
she can carry. 

And we are not to be diverted from the grim purpose of 
winning the war by any insincere approaches upon the sub- 
ject of peace. I can say with a clear conscience that I have 
tested those intimations and have found them insincere. I 
now recognize them for what they are, an opportunity to 



May i8] HONOR TO THE RED CROSS 257 

have a free hand, particularly in the East, to carry out pur- 
poses of conquest and exploitation. Every proposal with 
regard to accommodation in the West involves a reservation 
with regard to the East. Xow, so far as I am concerned, I 
intend to stand by Russia as well as France. The helpless 
and the friendless are the very ones that need friends and 
succor, and if any man in Germany thinks we are going to 
sacrifice anybody for our o\^ti sake, I tell them now they are 
mistaken. For the glory of this war, my fellow citizens, so 
far as we are concerned, is that it is, perhaps for the first 
time in history, an unselfish war. I could not be proud to 
fight for a selfish purpose, but I can be proud to fight for 
mankind. If they wish peace, let them come forward through 
accredited representatives and lay their terms on the table. 
We have laid ours, and they know what they are. 

But behind all this grim purpose, my friends, lies the op- 
portunity to demonstrate not only force, which will be dem- 
onstrated to the utmost, but the opportunity to demonstrate 
character, and it is that opportunity that we have most con- 
spicuously in the work of the Red Cross. Not that our men 
in arms do not represent our character, for they do, and it is 
a character which those who see and realize appreciate and 
admire, but their duty is the duty of force. The duty of the 
Red Cross is the duty of mercy and succor and friendship. 

Have you form.ed a picture in your imagination of Avhat 
this war is doing for us and for the world? In my own mind 
I am convinced that not a hundred years of peace could have 
I'nitted this Nation together as this single year of war has 
knitted it together; and better even than that, if possible, it 
is knitting the world together. Look at the picture! In the 
center of the scene, four nations engaged against the world, 
and at every point of vantage, showing that they are seeking 
selfish aggrandizement; and against them, twenty-three gov- 
ernments, representing the greater part of the population of 
the world, dra^^^l together into a new sense of community of 
interest, a new sense of community of purpose, a new sense 
of unity of life. The Secretary of War told me an interesting 
incident the other day. He said when he was in Italy a 
member of the Italian Government was explaining to him the 
many reasons why Italy felt near to the United States. 



258 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSOX [1918 

He said, "If 3^ou want to try an interesting experiment, go 
up to any one of these troop trains and ask in English how 
many of them have been in America, and see what happens." 
He tried the experiment. He went up to a troop train and 
he asked, "How many of you boys have been in America?" 
and he said it seemed to him as if half of them sprang up: 
"Me from San Francisco," "Me from New York," — all over. 
There was part of the heart of America in the Italian Army, 
— people that had been knitted to us by association, who 
knew us, v;ho had lived amongst us, who had worked shoulder 
to shoulder with us, and now, friends of America, were fight- 
ing for their native Italy. 

Friendship is the only cement that will ever hold the world 
together. And this intimiate contact of the great Red Cross 
with the peoples who are suffering the terrors and depriva- 
tions of this war is going to be one of the greatest instrumen- 
talities of friendship that the world ever knew; and the cen- 
ter of the heart of it all, if we sustain it properly, will be 
this land that we so dearly love. 

My friends, a great day of duty has come, and duty finds 
a man's soul as no kind of work can ever find it. May I say 
this: The duty that faces us all now is to serve one another. 
No man can afford to make a fortune out of this war. There 
are men amongst us who have forgotten that, if they ever saw 
it. Some of you are old enough — I am old enough — to re- 
member men who made fortunes out of the CivilWar, and 
you know how they were regarded by their fellow citizens. 
That was a war to save one country. This is a war to save 
the world. And your relation to the Red Cross is one of the 
relations which will relieve you of the stigma. You cannot 
give anything to the Government of the United States. It 
will not accept it. There is a law of Congress against ac- 
cepting even services without pay. The only thing that the 
Government will accept is a loan and duties' performed, but 
it is a ^reat deal better to give than to lend or to pay, and 
your great channel for giving is the American Red Cross. 
DowTi in your hearts you can not take very much satisfaction 
in the last analysis in lending money to the Government of 
the United States, because the interest which you draw will 
burn your pockets. It is a commercial transaction; and some 



May i8] HONOR TO THE RED CROSS 259 

men have even dared to cavil at the rate of interest, not 
knowing the incidental commentary that that constitutes upon 
their attitude. 

But when you give, something of your heart, something of 
your soul, something of yourself goes with the gift, particu- 
larly when it is given in such form that it never can come 
back by w^ay of direct benefit to yourself. You know there 
is the old cynical definition of gratitude, as "the lively ex- 
pectation of favors to come." Well, there is no expectation 
of favors to come in this kind of giving. These things are 
bestowed in order that the worW may be a fitter place to live 
in, that men may be succored, that homes may be restored, 
that suffering may'be relieved, that the face of the earth may 
have the blight of destruction removed from it, and that 
wherever force goes, there shall go mercy and helpfulness. 

And when you give, give absolutely all that you can spare, 
and do not consider yourself liberal in the giving. If you 
give with self-adulation, you are not giving at all, you are 
giving to your own vanity,. but if you give until it hurts, then 
your heart-blood goes into it. 

Think what we have here! We call it the American Red 
Cross, but it is merely a branch of a great international or- 
ganization which is not only recognized by the statutes of 
each of the civilized governments of the world, but is recog- 
nized by international agreement and treaty, as the recognized 
and accepted instrumentality of mercy and succor. And one 
of the deepest stains that rest upon the reputation of the 
German Army is that they have not respected the Red Cross. 
That goes to the root of the matter. They have not re- 
spected the instrum.entality they themselves participated in 
setting up as the thing which no man was to touch because 
it was the expression of common humanity. By being mem- 
bers of the American Red Cross, we are members of a great 
fraternity and comradeship which extends all over the world. 
This cross which these ladies bore to-day is an emblem of 
Christianity itself. 

It fills my imagination, ladies and gentlemen, to think of 
the women all over this country who are busy to-night, and 
are busy every night and every day, doing the work of the 
Red Cross, busy with a great eagerness to find out the most 



26o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

serviceable thing to do, busy with a forgetfulness of all the 
old frivolities of their social relationships, ready to curtail 
the duties of the household in order that they may contribute 
to this common work that all their hearts are engaged in and 
doing which their hearts become acquainted with each other. 
Wlien you think of this, you realize how the people ot the 
United States are being drawn together into a great intimate 
family whose heart is being used for the service of the soldiers 
not only, but for the service of civilians where they suffer and 
are lost in a maze of distresses and distractions. 

You have, then, this noble picture of justice and mercy as 
the two servants of liberty. For only where men are free do 
they think the thoughts of comradeship, only where they 
are free do they think the thoughts of s\Tnpathy, only where 
they are free are they mutually helpful, only where they are 
free do they realize their dependence upon one another and 
their comradeship in a common interest and common neces- 
sity. If you ladies and gentlemen could read some of the 
touching despatches which come through official channels, 
for even through those channels tHere come voices of human- 
ity that are infinitely pathetic: if you could catch some of 
those voices that speak the utter longing of oppressed and 
helpless peoples all over the world to hear something like the 
Battle H}Tnn of the Republic, to hear the feet of the great 
hosts of Liberty coming to set them free, to set their minds 
free, set their lives free, set their children free; you would 
know what comes into the heart of those who are trying to 
contribute all the brains and power they have to this great 
enterprise of Liberty. I summon you to the comradeship. 
I summon you in this next week to say how much and how 
sincerely and how unanimously you sustain the heart of the 
world. White House Pamphlet. 

81. WAR-TIME PROHIBITION 

(May 28, 1918) 

Letter to Senator Sheppard 

Thank you very much for \our letter of the 26th. Frankly, 
I was very much distressed by the action of the House. I do 



May 28] WAR-TIME PROHIBITION 261 

not think that it is \^^se or fair to attempt to put such com- 
pulsion on the Executive in a matter in which he has already 
acted almost to the limit of his authority. WTiat is almost 
entirely overlooked is that there are, as I am informed, very 
large stocks of whisky in this country, and it seems to me 
quite certain that if the brewing of beer were prevented en- 
tirely, along with all the other drinks, many of them harm- 
less, which are derived from food or food stuffs, the con- 
sumption of whisky would be stimulated and increased to 
a very considerable extent. 

My own judgment is that it is wise and statesmanlike to 
let the situation stand as it is for the present, until at any 
rate I shall be apprised by the Food Administration that it 
is necessary in the way suggested still further to conserve 
the supply of food and feed stuffs. The Food Administration 
has not thought it necessary to go any further than we have 
in that matter already gone. 

I thank you most cordially. Senator, for your kindness in 
consulting me in this matter, which is of very considerable 
importance, and has a very direct bearing upon many col- 
lateral questions. 

Congressional Record, LXI, 8033. 



82. DISINTERESTED SERVICE TO LATIN AMERICA 

(June 7, 1918) 

Address to Mexican Editors at the White House 

I have never received a group of men who were more wel- 
come than you are, because it has been one of my distresses 
during the period of my Presidency that the Mexican people 
did not more thoroughly understand the attitude of the 
United States toward Mexico. I think I can assure you, and 
I hope you have had every evidence of the truth of my 
assurance, that that attitude is one of sincere friendship. 
And not merely the sort of friendship which prompts one not 
to do his neighbor any harm, but the sort of friendship which 
earnestly desires to do his neighbor service. 



262 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

My own policy, the policy of my own administration, to- 
ward Mexico was at every point based upon this principle, 
that the internal settlement of the affairs of Mexico was none 
of our business: that we had no right to interfere with or to 
dictate to Mexico in any particular vrith regard to her own 
affairs. Take one aspect of our relations which at one time 
may have been difficult for you to understand: When we 
sent troops into Mexico, our sincere desire was nothing else 
than to assist you to get rid of a man who was making the 
settlement of your affairs for the time being impossible. We 
had no desire to use our troops for any other purpose, and 
I was in hopes that by assisting in that vvay and then im- 
mediately withdrawing, I might give substantial proof of 
the truth of the assurances that I had given your Government 
through President Carranza. 

And at the present time it distresses me to learn that cer- 
tain influences, which I assume to be German in their origin, 
are trying to make a wTong impression throughout Mexico 
as to the purposes of the United States, and not only a 
wrong impression, but to give an absolutely untrae account 
of things that happen. You know the distressing things that 
have been happening just off our coasts. You know of the 
vessels that have been sunk. I yesterday received a quota- 
tion from a paper in Guadalajara which stated that thirteen 
of our battleships had been sunk off the Capes of the Chesa- 
peake. You see how dreadful it is to have people so radically 
misinformed. It was added that our Navy Department was 
withholding the truth with regard to these sinkings. I have 
no doubt that the publisher of the paper published that in 
perfect innocence without intending to convey wrong im- 
pressions, but it is evident that allegations of that sort pro- 
ceed from those who wish to make trouble between Mexico 
and the United States. 

Now, gentlemen, for the time being at any rate, and I 
hope it will not be a short time, the influence of the United 
States is somewhat pervasive in the affairs of the world, and 
I believe that it is pervasive because the nations of the world 
which are less powerful than som.e of the greatest nations 
are coming to believe that our sincere desire is to do disinter- 
ested service. We are the champions of those nations which 



June 7] SERVICE TO LATIN AMERICA 263 

have not had a military standing which would enable them 
to compete with the strongest nations in the world, and I 
look forward with pride to the time, which I hope will soon 
come, when we can give substantial evidence, not only that 
we do not want anything out of this war, but that we would 
not accept anything out of it, that it is absolutely a case of 
disinterested action. And if you \\ill watch the attitude of 
our people, \'0U will see that nothing stirs them so deeply as 
assurances that this war, so far as we are concerned, is for 
idealistic objects. One of the difficulties that I experienced 
during the first three j^ears of the war, the years when the 
United States was not in the war, was in getting the foreign 
offices of European nations to believe that the United States 
was seeking nothing for herself, that her neutrality was not 
selfish, and that if she came in, she would not come in to get 
anything substantial out of the war, any material object, any 
territory or trade or anything else of that sort. In some of 
the foreign offices there were men who personally knew me 
and they believed, I hope, that I was sincere in assuring them 
that our purposes were disinterested, but they thought that 
these assurances came from an academic gentleman removed 
from the ordinary sources of information and speaking the 
idealistic purposes of the cloister. They did not believe that 
I was speaking the real heart of the American people, and I 
knew all along that I was. Now I believe that everybody 
who comes into contact with the American people knows that 
I am speaking their purposes. 

The other night in New York, at the opening of the cam- 
paign for funds for our Red Cross, I made an address. I 
had not intended to refer to Russia, but I was speaking with- 
out notes and in the course of what I said my thought was 
led to Russia, and I said that we meant to stand by Russia 
just as firmly as we would stand by France or England or 
any other of the Allies. The audience to which I was speak- 
ing was not an audience from which I v/ould have expected 
an enthusiastic response to that. It was rather too well 
dressed. It was not an audience, in other words, made of 
the class of people whom you would suppose to have the most 
intimate feeling for the sufferings of the ordinary man in 
Russia; but that audience jumped into the aisles, the whole 



264 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

audience rose to its feet, and nothing that I had said on that 
occasion aroused anything Hke the enthusiasm that that sin- 
gle sentence roused. Now, there is a sample, gentlemen. 
We cannot make anything out of Russia. We cannot make 
anything out of standing by Russia at this time, — the most 
remote of the European nations, so far as we are concerned, 
the one with which we have had the least connections in trade 
and advantage, — and yet the people of the United States 
rose to that suggestion as to no other that I made in that 
address. That is the heart of America, and we are ready 
to show you by any act of friendship that you may propose 
our real feelings toward Mexico. 

Some of us, if I may say so privately, look back with re- 
gret upon some of the more ancient relations that we have 
had with Mexico long before our generation; and America, if 
I may so express it, would now feel ashamed to take advan- 
tage of a neighbor. So, I hope that you can carry back to 
your homes something better than the assurances of words. 
You have had contact with our people. You know your 
own personal reception. You know how gladly we have 
opened to you the doors of every establish m.ent that you 
wanted to see and have shown you just what we were doing, 
and I hope you have gained the right impression as to why 
we were doing it. We are doing it, gentlemen, so that the 
world may never hereafter have to fear the only thing that 
any nation has to dread, the unjust and selfish aggression of 
another nation. Some time ago, as you probably all know, 
I proposed a sort of Pan-American agreement. I had per- 
ceived that one of the difficulties of our relationship with 
Latin America was this: The famous Monroe Doctrine was 
adopted without your consent, without the consent of any 
of the Central or South American States. If I may express 
it in terms that we so often use in this country, we said, '"We 
are going to be your big brother, whether you want us to be 
or not." We did not ask whether it was agreeable to you 
that we should be your big brother. We said we were going 
to be. Now, that was all very well so far as protecting you 
from aggression from the other side of the water was con- 
cerned, but there was nothing in it that protected you from 
aggression from us, and I have repeatedly seen the uneasy 



June 7] SERVICE TO LATIN AMERICA 265 

feeling on the part of representatives of the states of Central 
and South America that our self-appointed protection might 
be for our own benefit and our own interests and not for the 
interest of our neighbors. So said T, ''Very well, let us make 
an arrangement by which we v/ill give bond. Let us have a 
common guarantee, that all of us will sign, of political inde- 
pendence and territorial integrity. Let us agree that if any 
one of us, the United States included, violates the political 
independence or the territorial integrity of any of the others, 
all the others will jump on her. I pointed out to some of 
the gentlemen who were less inclined to enter into this 
arrangement than others that that was in effect giving bonds 
on the part of the United States, that we would enter into 
an arrangement by which you v/ould be protected from us. 

Now, that is the kind of agreement that will have to be 
the foundation of the future life of the nations of the world, 
gentlemen. The whole family of nations will have to guar- 
antee to each nation that no nation shall violate its political 
independence or its territorial integrity. That is the basis, 
the only conceivable basis, for the future peace of the world, 
and I must admit that I was ambitious to have the states 
of the two continents of America show the way to the rest 
of the world as to how to make a basis of peace. Peace can 
come only by trust. As long as there is suspicion, there is 
going to be misunderstanding, and as long as there is mis- 
understanding there is going to be trouble. If you can 
once get a situation of trust, then you have got a situation 
of permanent peace. Therefore, everyone of us, it seems to 
rrie, owes it as a patriotic duty to his own country to plant 
the seeds of trust and of confidence instead of the seeds of 
suspicion and variety of interest. That is the reason that I 
began by saying to you that I have not had the pleasure 
of meeting a group of men who were more welcome than 
you are, because you are our near neighbors. Suspicion on 
your part or misunderstanding on your pare distresses us 
more than we would be distressed by similar feelings on the 
part of those less nearby. 

When you reflect how wonderful a storehouse of treasure 
Mexico is, \'ou can .see how her future must depend upon 
peace and honor, so that nobody shall exploit her. It must 



266 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191S 

depend upon every nation that has any relations with her, 
and the citizens of any nation that has relations with her, 
keeping within the bounds of honor and fair dealing and jus- 
tice, because so soon as you can admit your own capital 
and the capital of the world to the free use of the resources 
of Mexico, it will be one of the most wonderfully rich and 
prosperous countries in the world. And when 3^ou have the 
foundations of established order, and the world has come 
to its senses again, we shall, I hope, have the very best con- 
nections that will assure us all a permanent cordiality and 
friendship. 

The World Court, July, 19 18, pp. 445-447. 

^^. FOUR FACTORS OF WORLD PEACE 

(July 4, 1918) 

Address at Mount Vernon 

I am happy to draw apart with you to this quiet place 
of old counsel in order to speak a little of the meaning of 
this day of our nation's independence. The place seems 
very still and remote. It is as serene and untouched by the 
hurry of the world as it was in those great days long ago 
when General Washington was here and held leisurely con- 
ference with the men who were to be associated with him 
in the creation of a nation. From these gentle slopes they 
looked out upon the world and saw it whole, saw it with the 
light of the future upon it, saw it with modern eyes that 
turned away from a past which men of liberated spirits 
could no longer endure. It is for that reason that we cannot 
feel, even here, in the immediate presence of this sacred 
tomb, that this is a place of death. It was a place of achieve- 
ment. A great promise that was meant for all mankind was 
here given plan and reality. The associations by which we 
are here surrounded are the inspiriting associations of that 
noble death which is only glorious consummation. From 
this green hillside we also ought to be able to see with 
comprehending eyes the world that lies around us and con- 
ceive anew the purpose that must set men free. 



July 4] FOUR FACTORS OF WORLD PEACE 267 

It is significant — significant of their o\mi character and 
purpose and of the influences they were setting afoot — that 
Washington and his associates, like the Barons at Runny- 
mede, spoke and acted, not for a class, but for a people. 
It has been left for us to see to it that it shall be under- 
stood that they spoke and acted, not for a single people 
only, but for all mankind. They were thinking not of them- 
selves and of the material interests which centered in the 
little groups of landholders and merchants and men of affairs 
with whom they were accustomed to act, in Virginia and 
the colonies to the north and south of her, but of a people 
which wished to be done with classes and special interests 
and the authority of men whom they had not themselves 
chosen to rule over them. They entertained no private pur- 
pose, desired no peculiar privilege. They were consciously 
planning that men of every class should be free and America 
a place to which men out of every nation might resort who 
wished to share with them the rights and privileges of free 
men. And we take our cue from them — do we not? We 
intend w^hat they intended. We here in America believe our 
participation in this present war to be only the fruitage of 
what they planted. Our case differs from theirs only in this, 
that it is our inestimable privilege to concert with men out 
of every nation who shall make not only the liberties of 
America secure but the liberties of every other people as 
well. We are happy in the thought that we are permitted to 
do w^hat they would have done had they been in our place. 
There must now be settled, once for all, w^hat was settled 
for America in the great age upon whose inspiration w^e draw 
to-day. This is surely a fitting place from which calmly to 
look out upon our task, that we may fortify our spirits for 
its accomplishment. And this is the appropriate place from 
which to avow, alike to the friends v/ho look on and to the 
friends with whom we have the happiness to be associated 
in action, the faith and purpose with which we act. 

This, then, is our conception of the great struggle in 
which we are engaged. The plot is written plain upon every 
scene cmd every act of the supreme tragedy. On the one 
hand stand the peoples of the world — not only the peoples 
actually engaged, but many others, also, who suffer under 



268 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

mastery but cannot act: peoples of many races and in every 
part of the world — the people of stricken Russia still, among 
the rest, though they are for the moment unorganized and 
helpless. Opposed to them, masters of many armies, stand 
an isolated, friendless group of Governments, who speak no 
common purpose, but only selfish ambitions of their own, 
by which none can profit but themselves, and whose peoples 
are fuel in their hands ; Governments which fear their people, 
and yet are for the time being sovereign lords, making every 
choice for them and disposing of their lives and fortunes as 
they will, as well as of the lives and fortunes of every people 
who fall under their power — Governments clothed with the 
strange trappings and the primitive authority of an age that 
is altogether alien and hostile to our own. The Past and the 
Present are in deadly grapple, and the peoples of the world 
are being done to death between them. 

There can be but one issue. The settlement must be 
final. There can be no compromise. No halfway decision 
would be tolerable. No halfway decision is conceivable. 
These are the ends for which the associated peoples of the 
world are fighting and which must be conceded them before 
there can be peace: 

I. — The destruction of every arbitrary power anywhere that 
can separately, secretly, and of its single choice disturb the 
peace of the world ; or, if it cannot be presently destroyed, at 
the least its reduction to virtual impotence. 

II. — The settlement of every question, whether of terri- 
tory, of sovereignty, of economic arrangement, or of political 
relationship, upon the basis of the free acceptance of that 
settlement by the people immediately concerned, and hot 
upon the basis of the m.aterial interest or advantage of any 
other nation or people which may desire a different settle- 
ment for the sake of its own exterior influence or mastery. 

III. — The consent of ail nations to be governed in their 
conduct toward each other by the same principles of honor 
and of respect for the common law of civilized society, that 
govern the individual citizens of ail modern States in their 
relations with one another; to the end that all promises and 
covenants may be sacredly observed, no private plots or 
conspiracies hatched, no selfish injuries wrought with im- 



July 4] FOUR FACTORS OF WORLD PEACE 269 

punity, and a mutual trust established upon the handsome 
foundation of a mutual respect for right. 

IV — The establishment of an organization of peace which 
shall make it certain that the combined power of free nations 
will check every invasion of right and serve to make peace 
and justice the miore secure by affording a definite tribunal 
of opinion to which all must submit and by which every 
international readjustment that cannot be amicably agreed 
upon by the peoples directly concerned shall be sanctioned. 

These great objects can be put into a single sentence. 
What we seek is the reign of law, based upon the consent 
of the governed and sustained by the organized opinion of 
mankind. 

These great ends cannot be achieved by debating and 
seeking to reconcile and accommodate what statesmen may 
wish with their projects for balances of powder and of national 
opportunity. They can be realized only by the determina- 
tion of what the thinking peoples of the world desire, with 
their longing hope for justice and for social freedom and 
opportunity. 

I can fancy that the air of this place carries the accents 
of such principles with a peculiar kindness. Here were 
started forces which the great nation against which they 
were primarily directed at first regarded as a revolt against 
its rightful authority, but which it has long since seen to have 
been a step in the liberation of its own people as well as 
of the people of the United States; and I stand here now 
to speak — speak proudly and with confident hope — of the 
spread of this revolt, this liberation, to the great stage of 
the world itself! The blinded rulers of Prussia have roused 
forces they knew little of — forces which, once roused, can 
never be crushed to earth again; for they have at heart an 
inspiration and a purpose which are deathless and of the 
very stuff of triumph! 

The World Court, July, 1918. 



270 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 
84. LYNCHING IS UNPATRIOTIC 

(July 26, 1918) 
Public Address to Fellow Countrymen 

I take the liberty of addressing you upon a subject which 
so vitally affects the honor of the nation and the very char- 
acter and integrity of our institutions that I trust you will 
think me justified in speaking verA^ plainly about it. 

I allude to the mob spirit which has recently here and 
there very frequently shown its head among us, not in any 
single region but in man}^ and widely separated parts of the 
country. There have been many lynchings, and every one 
of them has been a blow at the heart of ordered law and 
humane justice. 

No man who loves America, no man who really cares for 
her fame and honor and character, or who is truly loyal to 
her institutions, can justify mob action while the courts of 
justice are open and the governments of the states and the 
nation are ready and able to do their duty. 

We are at this very moment fighting lawless passion. 
German}^ has outlav/ed herself among the nations because 
she has disregarded the sacred obligations cf law and has 
made lynchers of her armies. Lynchers emulate her dis- 
graceful example. I, for my part, am anxious to see every 
communit}^ in America rise above that level, with pride 
and a fixed resolution which no man or set of men can 
afford to despise. 

We proudly claim to be the champions of democracy. If 
we really are in deed and in truth let us see to it that we do 
not discredit our o\ati. I say plainly that every American 
who takes part in the action of a mob or gives any sort of 
countenance is no true son of this great democracy, but its 
betrayer, and does more to discredit her by that single dis- 
loyalty to her standards of law and right than the words 
of her statesmen or the sacrifices of her heroic bo}/s in the 
trenches can do to make suffering peoples believe her to be 
their savior. 

How shall we commend democracy to the acceptance of 



July 26] LYNXHING IS UNPATRIOTIC 271 

other peoples if we disgrace our own by proving that it is, 
after all, no protection to the weak? Every mob contributes 
to German lies about the United States what her most 
gifted liars cannot improve upon by the w^ay of calumny. 
They can at least say that such things cannot happen in 
Germany except in times of revolution, when law is swept 
away ! 

I therefore very earnestly and solemnly beg that the 
governors of all the states, the law officers of every com- 
munity, and, above all, the men and women of every com- 
munity in the United States, all who revere America and 
wish to keep her name without stain or reproach, will co- 
operate — not passively merely, but actively and watchfully 
— to make an end of this disgraceful evil. It cannot live 
vrhere the community does not countenance it. 

I have called upon the nation to put its great energ>^ into 
this w^ar, and it has responded — responded with a spirit and 
a genius for action that has thrilled the world. I now call 
upon it, upon its men and women everyw'here, to see to it 
that its laws are kept inviolate, its fame untarnished. 

Let us show our utter contempt for the things that have 
made this war hideous among the wars of history by show- 
ing how those who love liberty and right and justice and 
are willing to lay down their lives for them upon foreign 
fields stand ready also to illustrate to all manldnd their 
loyalty to all things at home which they wish to see estab- 
lished everywhere as a blessing and protection to the peoples 
who have never known the privilege of liberty and self- 
government. 

I can never accept any man as a champion of liberty either 
for ourselves or for the world who does rot reverence and 
obey the laws of our own beloved land, whose laws we our- 
selves have made. He has adopted the standards of the ene- 
mies of his country, whom he affects to despise. 

New York Times, July 27, 19 18. 



272 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 ) 

85. REBUILDING OF PALESTINE ^ 

\ 

(August 31, 1918) C 

Letter to Rabbi Wise 1 

I have watched with deep and sincere interest the recon- ; 
structive work which the Weizmann Commission has done , 
in Palestine at the instance of the British Government, and j 
I welcome an opportunity to express the satisfaction I have 
felt in the progress of the Zionist movement in the United ! 
States and in the allied countries since the declaration by i 
Mr. Balfour on behalf of the British Government of Great 
Britain's approval of the establishment in Palestine of a | 
national home for the Jewish people and his promise that | 
the British Government would use its best endeavors to 1 
facilitate the achievement of that object, with the under- 
standing that nothing would be done to prejudice the civil ; 
and religious rights of non- Jewish people in Palestine or the 
rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in other countries. 

I think that all Am.ericans will be deeply moved by the ; 

report that even in this time of stress the Weizmann Com- , 

mission has been able to lay the foundation of the Hebrew ! 

University at Jerusalem with the promise that that bears \ 

of spiritual rebirth. ^ 

New York Times, Sept. 5, 19 18. j 



86. GERMAN WAR AGAINST LABOR 

(September i, 19 18) 

Public Message to Labor on Labor Day 

Labor day, 19 18, is not like any Labor day that we have 
known. Labor day was always deeply significant with us. 
Now it is supremely significant. Keenly as we were aware 
a year ago of the enterprise of life and death upon which 
the nation had em.barked, we did not perceive its meaning 
as clearly as we do now. 



J 



Sept. i] CxERMAN WAR AGAINST LABOR 273 

We knew that we were all partners and must stand and 
strive together, but we did not realize as we do now that 
we are all enlisted men, members of a single army of many 
parts and many tasks, but commanded by a single obliga- 
tion, our faces set towards a single object. We now know 
that every tool in every essential industry is a weapon 
and a weapon wielded for the same purpose that an army 
rifle is wielded, a weapon which if we were to lay down, no 
rifle would be of any use. 

And a weapon for what? What is the war for? Why are 
we enlisted? Why should we be ashamed if w^e were not 
enlisted? At first it seemed hardly more than a war of 
defense against the military aggression of Germany. Bel- 
gium had been violated, France invaded and Germany was 
afield again, as in 1870 and 1866, to work out her ambi- 
tions in Europe and it was necessary to meet her force with 
force. But it is clear now that it is much more than a war 
to alter the balance of power in Europe. 

Germany, it is now plain, w^as striking at what free men 
everywhere desired and must have — the right to determine 
their own fortunes, to insist upon justice and to oblige gov- 
ernments to act for them and not for the private and selfish 
interest of a governing class. It is a war to make the nations 
and peoples of the world secure against every such power as 
the German autocracy represents. 

It is a war of emancipation. ISTot until it is won can m.en 
anywhere live free from constant fear or breathe freely 
while they go about their daily tasks and know that govern- 
ments are their ser\'ants, not their masters. 

This is, therefore, the war of all wars, w^hich labor should 
support with all its concentrated power. The world cannot 
be safe, the men's lives cannot be secure, no man's rights can 
be confidently and successfully asserted against the rule and 
mastery of arbitrary groups and special interests so long as 
governments like that which after long premeditation drew 
Austria and Germany into this w^ar are permitted to control 
the destinies and the daily fortunes of men and nations, 
plotting while honest men work, laying the fires of which 
innocent men, women and children are to be the fuel. 

You know the nature of this war. It is a war which 



274 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

industry must sustain. The army of laborers at home is as 
important, as essential as the army of fighting men in the 
far fields of actual battle. And the laborer is not only needed 
as much as the soldier. It is his war. The soldier is his 
champion and representative. To fail to win would be to 
imperil everything that the laborer has striven for and held 
dear since freedom first had its da-wn and his struggle for 
justice began. 

The soldiers at the front know this. It steels their muscles 
to think of it. They are crusaders. They are fighting for no 
selfish advantage of their own. They would despise anyone 
who fought for the selfish advantage of any nation. They 
are giving their lives that homes everywhere as w^ell as the 
homes they love in America may be kept sacred and safe 
and men everywhere be free, as they insist upon being free. 
They are fighting for the ideals of their own land — great 
ideals, immortal ideals, ideals which shall light the way for 
all men to the places w^here justice is done and men live 
with lifted heads and emancipated spirits. That is the reason 
they fight with solemn joy and are invincible. 

Let us make this, therefore, a day of fresh comprehen- 
sion not onl}^ of what w^e are about and of renewed clear- 
eyed reason but a day of concentration also in which we 
devote ourselves without pause or limit to the great task 
of setting our own country and the v/hole w^orld free to 
render justice to all and of making it impossible for small 
groups of political rulers anyw^here to disturb our peace or 
the peace of the world or in any way to make tools and 
puppets of those upon w^hose consent and upon whose power 
their own authority and their own very existence depends. 

We may count upon each other. The nation is a single 
mind. It is taking counsel with no special class. It is serv- 
ing no private or single interest. Its o^^^l mind has been 
cleared and fortified by these days which burn the dross 
away. The light of a new conviction has penetrated to every 
class among us. We realize as we never realized before that 
we are comrades dependent upon one another, irresistible 
when united, powerless when divided. And so we join 
hands to lead the world to a new and better day. 

Boston Herald, Sept. 2, 19 18. 



Sept. 1 6] A FEW WORDS TO AUSTRIA 275 

• 87. A FEW WORDS TO AUSTRIA 

(September 16, 19 18) 

Despatch to the Austrian Government Through 
Secretary Lansing 

The Government of the United States feels that there is 
only one reply which it can make to the suggestion of the 
Imperial Austro-Hungarian Government. It has repeatedly 
and with entire candor stated the terms upon which the 
United States would consider peace and can and will enter- 
tain no proposal for a conference upon a matter concern- 
ing which it has made its position and purpose so plain. 
New York Times j Sept. 17, 19 18. 

d>^. FIVE NEEDS OF PERMANENT PEACE 

(September 27, 19 18) 

Address to Public Meeting in New York, Opening the 
Fourth Liberty Loan 

I am not here to promote the loan. That will be done — 
ably and enthusiastically done — by the hundreds of thou- 
sands of loyal and tireless men and women who have under- 
taken to present it to you and to our fellow citizens through- 
out the country; and I have not the least doubt of their 
complete success; for I know their spirit and the spirit of 
the country. My confidence is confirmed, too, by the 
thoughtful and experienced cooperation of the bankers here 
and everywhere, who are lending their invaluable aid and 
guidance. I have come, rather, to seek an opportunity to 
present to you some thoughts which I trust will serve to 
give you, in perhaps fuller measure than before, a vivid 
sense of the great issues involved, in order that you may 
appreciate and accept with added enthusiasm the grave sig- 
nificance of the duty of supporting the Government by your 
men and your means to the utmost point of sacrifice and 
self-denial. No man or woman who has really taken in 



276 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

what this war means can hesitate to give to the very limit 
of what they have; and it is my mission here to-night to try 
to make it clear once more what the war really means. You 
will need no other stimulation or reminder of your duty. 

At every turn of the war we gain a fresh consciousness of 
what \we mean to accomplish by it. When our hope and 
expectation are most excited we think more definitely than 
before of the issues that hang upon it and of the purposes 
w^hich must be realized by means of it. For it has positive 
and well-defined purposes which we did not determine and 
which we cannot alter. No statesman or assembly created 
them; no statesman or assembly can alter them. They have 
arisen out of the very nature and circumstances of the war. 
The most that statesmen or assemblies can do is to carry 
them out or be false to them^. They were perhaps not clear 
at the outset; but they are clear now. The war has lasted 
more than four years and the whole world has been drawn 
into it. The common will of mankind has been substituted 
for the particular purposes of individual States. Individual 
statesmen may have started the conflict, but neither they nor 
their opponents can stop it as they please. It has become 
a peoples' war, and peoples of all sorts and races, of every 
degree of power and variety of fortune, are involved in its 
sweeping processes of change and settlement. We came 
into it when its character had become fully defined and it 
was plain that no nation could stand apart or be indifferent 
to its outcome. Its challenge drove to the heart of every- 
thing we cared for and lived for. The voice of the war had 
become clear and gripped our hearts. Our brothers from 
many lands, as well as our ovm murdered dead under the 
sea, were calling to us, and we responded, fiercely and of 
course. 

The air was clear about us. We saw things in their full, 
convincing proportions as they were ; and we have seen them 
with steady eyes and unchanging comprehension ever since. 
We accepted the issues of the war as facts, not as any group 
of men either here or elsewhere had defined them, and we 
can accept no outcome which does not squarely meet and 
settle them. Those issues are these: 

Shall the military power of any nation or group of nations 



.1 



Sept. 27] FIVE NEEDS OF PERMAXEXT PEACE 277 

be suffered to determine the fortunes of peoples over whom 
they have no right to rule except the right of force? 

Shall strong nations be free to wrong weak nations and 
make them subject to their purpose and interest? 

Shall peoples be ruled and dominated, even in their own 
internal affairs, by arbitrary and irresponsible force or by 
their own will and choice? 

Shall there be a common standard of right and privilege 
for all peoples and nations or shall the strong do as they will 
and the weak suffer without redress? 

Shall the assertion of right be haphazard and by casual 
alliance or shall there be a common concert to oblige the 
observance of common rights? 

'So man, no group of men, chose these to be the issues of 
the struggle. They are the issues of it; and they must be 
settled — by no arrangement or compromise or adjustment of 
interests, but definitely and once for all and with a full and 
unequivocal acceptance of the principle that the interest of 
the weakest is as sacred as the interest of the strongest. 

This is what we mean when we speak of a permanent 
peace, if we speak sincerely, intelligently, and with a real 
knowledge and comprehension of the matter we deal with. 

We are all agreed that there can be no peace obtained by 
any kind of bargain or compromise with the Governments 
of the Central Empires, because we have dealt with them 
already and have seen them deal with other Governments 
that were parties to this struggle, at Brest-Litovsk and 
Bucharest. They have convinced us that they are without 
honor and do not intend justice. They observe no cove- 
nants, accept no principle but force and their own interest. 
We cannot "come to terms" with them. They have made 
it impossible. The German people must by this time be 
fully aware that we cannot accept the word of those who 
forced this war upon us. We do not think the same thoughts 
or speak the same language of agreement. 

It is of capital importance that we should also be explicitly 
agreed that no peace shall be obtained by any kind of 
compromise or abatement of the prircinles we have avowed 
as the principles for which we are fighting. There should 
exist no doubt about that. I am, therefore, going to take 



278 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

the liberty of speaking with the utmost frankness about the 
practical implications that are involved in it. 

If it be indeed and in truth the common object of the 
Governments associated against Germany and of the nations 
whom they govern, as I believe it to be, to achieve by the 
com.ing settlements a secure and lasting peace, it will be 
necessary that all who sit do\Mi at the peace table shall come 
ready and willing to pay the price, the only price, that will 
procure it; and ready and willing, also, to create in some 
virile fashion the only instrumentality by which it can be 
made certain that the agreements of the peace will be honored 
and fulfilled. 

That price is impartial justice in every item of the settle- 
ment, no matter whose interest is crossed; and not only 
impartial justice, but also the satisfaction of the several peo- 
ples whose fortunes are dealt with. That indispenasble in- 
strumentality is a League of Nations formed under cove- 
nants that will be efficacious. Without such an instru- 
m.entality, by which the peace of the world can be guaran- 
teed, peace will rest in part upon the word of outlaws, and 
only upon that word. For Germany will have to redeem 
her character, not by what happens at the peace table but by 
what follows. 

And, as I see it, the constitution of that League of Nations 
and the clear definition of its objects must be a part, is in a 
sense the most essential part, of the peace settlement itself. 
It cannot be formed now. If formed now, it would be merely 
a new alliance confined to the nations associated against a 
common enemy. It is not likely that it could be formed 
after the settlement. It is necessary to guarantee the peace; 
and the peace cannot be guaranteed as an afterthought. 
The reason, to speak in plain terms again, why it must be 
guaranteed is that there will be parties to the peace whose 
promises have proved untrustworthy, and means must be 
found in connection with the peace settlement itself to re- 
move that source of insecurity. It would be folly to leave 
the guarantee to the subsequent voluntary action of the 
Governments we have seen destroy Russia and deceive 
Rumania. 

But these general terms do not disclose the whole matter. 



Sept. 27] FIVE NEEDS OF PERMANENT PEACE 279 

Some details are needed to make them sound less like a 
thesis and more like a practical program. These, then, are 
some of the particulars, and I state them with the greater 
confidence because I can state them authoritatively as rep- 
resenting this Government's interpretation of its own duty 
with regard to peace: 

First,- the impartial justice meted out must involve no 
discrimination between those to whom we wish to be just and 
those to whom we do not wish to be just. It must be a 
justice that plays no favorites and knows no standard but 
the equal rights of the several peoples concerned; 

Second, no special or separate interest of any single nation 
or any group of nations can be made the basis of any part of 
the settlement which is not consistent with the common 
interest of all; 

Third, there can be no leagues or alliances or special cove- 
nants and understandings within the general and common 
family of the League of Nations; 

Fourth, and more specifically, there can be no special, 
selfish economic combinations within the league and no em- 
ployment or any form of economic boycott or exclusion 
except as the power of economic penalty by exclusion from 
the markets of the world may be vested in the League of 
Nations itself as a means of discipline and control: 

Fifth, all international agreements and treaties of every 
kind must be made known in their entirety to the rest of 
the world. 

Special alliances and economic rivalries and hostilities have 
been the prolific source in the modern world of the plans 
and passions that produce war. It would be an insincere 
as well as an insecure peace that did not exclude them in 
definite and binding terms. 

The confidence with which I venture to speak for our 
people in these matters does not spring from our traditions 
merely and the well-known principles of international action 
which we have always professed and followed. In the same 
sentence in which I say that the United States will enter into 
no special arrangements or understandings with particular 
nations let me say also that the United States is prepared 
to assume its full share of responsibility for the maintenance 



28o ADDRESSES OF PRESIDEXT WILSON [1918 

of the common covenants and understandings upon which 
peace must henceforth rest. We still read Washington's 
immortal warning against "entangling alliances" with full 
comprehension and an answering purpose. But only special 
and limited alliances entangle; and we recognize and accept 
the duty of a new day in which we are permitted to hope 
for a general alliance which will avoid entanglements and 
clear the air of the world for common understandings and 
the maintenance of common rights. 

I have made this analysis of the international situation 
which the war has created, not, of course, because I doubted 
whether the leaders of the great nations and peoples with 
whom we are associated were of the same mind and enter- 
tained a like purpose, but because the air every now and 
again gets darkened by mists and groundless doubtings and 
mischievous perversions of counsel and it is necessary once 
and again to sweep all the irresponsible talk about peace 
intrigues and weakening morale and doubtful purpose on the 
part of those in authority utterly, and if need be uncere- 
moniously, aside and say things in the plainest words that 
can be found, even when it is only to say over again what 
has been said before, quite as plainly if in less unvarnished 
terms. 

As I have said, neither I nor any other man in govern- 
mental authority created or gave form to the issues of this 
war. I have simply responded to them with such vision 
as I could command. But I have responded gladly and 
v^ith a resolution that has grown warmer and more con- 
fident as the issues have grown clearer and clearer. It is 
now plain that they are issues which no man can pervert 
unless it be wilfully. I am bound to fight for them, and 
happy to fight for them as time and circumstance have 
revealed them to me as to all the world. Our enthusiasm 
for them grows more and more irresistible as they stand out 
in more and more vivid and unmistakable outline. 

And the forces that fight for them draw into closer and 
closer array, organize their millions into more and more un- 
conquerable might, as they become more and more distinct 
to the thought and purpose of the peoples engaged. It is the 
peculiarity of this great war that while statesmen have 



Sept. 27] FIVE NEEDS OF PERMANENT PEACE 281 

seemed to cast about for definitions of their purpose and 
have sometimes seemed to shift their ground and their point 
of view, the thought of the mass of men, whom statesmen 
are supposed to instruct and lead, has gro\\Ti more and 
more unclouded, more and more certain of what it is that 
they are fighting for. National purposes have fallen more 
and more into the background and the common purpose of 
enlightened mankind has taken their place. The counsels 
of plain men have become on all hands more simple and 
straightforward and more unified than the counsels of sophis- 
ticated men of affairs, who still retain the impression that 
they are playing a game of power and playing for high 
stakes. That is why I have said that this is a peoples' war, 
not a statesmen's. Statesmen must follow the clarified 
common thought or be broken. 

I take that to be the significance of the fact that assem- 
blies and associations of many kinds made up of plain 
workaday people have demanded, almost every time they 
came together, and are still demanding, that the leaders of 
their Governments declare to them plainly what it is, exactly 
what it is, that they are seeking in this w^ar, and what they 
think the items of the final settlement should be. They are 
not yet satisfied \^ith what they have been told. They still 
seem to fear that they are getting what they ask for only 
in statesmen's terms, — only in the terms of territorial ar- 
rangements and divisions of power, and not in terms of 
broad-visioned justice and mercy and peace and the satis- 
faction of those deep-seated longings of oppressed and dis- 
tracted men and women and enslaved peoples that seem to 
them the only things worth fighting a war for that engulfs 
the world. Perhaps statesmen have not always recognized 
this changed aspect of the whole world of policy and action. 
Perhaps they have not always spoken in direct reply to the 
questions asked because they did not know how searching 
those questions were and what sort of answers they de- 
manded. 

But I, for one, am glad to attempt the answer again and 
again, in the hope that I may make it clearer and clearer 
that my one thought is to satisfy those who struggle in the 
ranks and are, perhaps above all others, entitled to a reply 



282 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

whose meaning no one can have any excuse for misunder- 
standing, if he understands the language in which it is spoken 
or can get someone to translate it correctly into his own. 
And I believe that the leaders of the Governments with which 
we are associated will speak, as they have occasion, as 
plainly as I have tried to speak. I hope that they will feel 
free to say whether they think that I am in any degree 
mistaken in my interpretation of the issues involved or in 
my purpose with regard to the means by which a satisfactory 
settlement of those issues may be obtained. Unity of pur- 
pose and of counsel are as imperatively necessary in this 
war as was unity of command in the battlefield; and with 
perfect unity of purpose and counsel will come assurance 
of complete victory. It can be had in no other way. 
"Peace drives" can be effectively neutralized and silenced 
only by showing that every victory of the nations associated 
against Germany brings the nations nearer the sort of peace 
which will bring security and reassurance to all peoples and 
make the recurrence of another such struggle of pitiless force 
and bloodshed forever impossible, and that nothing else can. 
Germany is constantly intimating the "terms" she will accept; 
and always finds that the world does not want terms. It 
wishes the final triumph of justice and fair dealing. 

New York Times, Sept. 28, 19 18. 



89. COLLEGE SOLDIERS 

(October i, 1918) 

Public Message to the Student Corps 

The step you have taken is a most significant one. By 
it you have ceased to be merely individuals, each seeking 
to perfect himself to win his own place in the world, and 
have become comrades in the common cause of making the 
world a better place to live in. You have joined yourselves 
to the entire manhood of the country, and pledged, as did 
your forefathers, "your lives, your fortunes and your sacred 
honor to the freedom of humanity." 



Oct. i] COLLEGE SOLDIERS 283 

The enterprise upon which you have embarked is a 
hazardous and difficult one. This is not a war of words; 
this is not a scholastic struggle. It is a war of ideals, yet 
fought \Aith all the devices of science and with the power 
of machinery. To succeed, you must not only be inspired 
by the ideals for which this country stands, but you must 
also be masters of the technique with which the battle is 
fought. You must not only be thrilled with zeal for the 
common welfare, but you must also be master of the weapons 
of to-day. 

There can be no doubt of the issue. The spirit that is 
revealed and the manner in which America has responded to 
the call is indomitable. I have no doubt that you will use 
your utmost strength to maintain that spirit to carry it for- 
ward to the final victory that will certainly be ours. 

Boston Herald, Oct. 2, 19 18. 



90. QUESTION OF AN ARMISTICE 

(October 8, 1918) 

Despatch to the German Government Through 
Secretary Lansing 

Before making reply to the request of the Imperial Ger- 
man Government and in order that that reply shall be as 
candid and straightforward as the momentous interests in- 
volved require, the President of the United States deems it 
necessary to assure himself of the exact meaning of the note 
of the Imperial Chancellor. 

Does the Imperial Chancellor mean that the Imperial Ger- 
man Government accepts the terms laid down by the Presi- 
dent in his address to the Congress of the United States on 
the 8th of January last and in subsequent addresses cmd that 
its object in entering into discussions would be only to agree 
upon the practical details of their application? 

The President feels bound to say with regard to the 
suggestion of an armistice that he would not feel at liberty 
to propose a cessation of arms to the governments with which 



284 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [191S 

the government of the United States is associated against 
the Central Powers so long as the armies of those powers are 
upon their soil. The good faith of any discussion would 
manifestly depend upon the consent of the Central Powers 
immediately to withdraw their forces everjrwhere from 
invaded territory. 

The President also feels that he is justified in asking 
whether the Imperial Chancellor is speaking merely for the 
constituted authorities of the empire who have so far con- 
ducted the war. He deems the answer to these questions 
vital from every point of view. 

Boston Herald, Oct. 9, 1918. 



91. NO NEGOTIATED PEACE WITH GERMANY 

(October 14, 19 18) 

Despatch to the German Government Through 
Secretary Lansing 

The unqualified acceptance by the present German Gov- 
ernment and by a large majority of the Reichstag of the 
terms laid down by the President of the LTnited States of 
America in his address to the Congress of the United States 
on the 8th of January, 19 18, and in his subsequent ad- 
dresses, justifies the President in making a frank and direct 
statement of his decision with regard to the communications 
of the German Government of the 8th and 12th of October, 
1918. 

It must be clearly understood that the process of evacua- 
tion and the conditions of an armistice are matters which 
must be left to the judgment and advice of the military 
advisors of the Government of the United States and the 
Allied Governments, and the President feels it his duty to 
say that no arrangement can be accepted by the Govern- 
ment of the United States which does not provide abso- 
lutely satisfactory safeguards and guarantees of the main- 
tenance of the present military supremacy of the armies of 
the United States and the Allies in the field. 



Oct. 14] NO PEACE WITH GERMANY 285 

He feels confident that he can safely assume that nothing 
but this will also be the judgment and decision of the Allied 
Governments. 

The President feels that it is also his duty to add that 
neither the Government of the United States nor, he is quite 
sure, the Governments with which the Government of the 
United States is associated as a belligerent, will consent to 
consider an armistice so long as the armed forces of Germany 
continue the illegal and inhumane practices which they still 
persist in. 

At the very time that the German Government approaches 
the Government of the United States with proposals of peace, 
its submarines are engaged in sinking passenger ships at sea, 
and not the ships alone, but the very boats in which their 
passengers and crew seek to make their way to safety; 
and in their present enforced withdrawal from Flanders and 
France the German armies are pursuing a course of wanton 
destruction which has always been regarded as in direct 
violation of the rules and practices of civilized warfare. 
Cities and villages, if not destroyed, are being stripped of all 
they contain, not only, but often of their very inhabitants. 
The nations associated against Germany cannot be expected 
to agree to a cessation of arms w^hile acts of inhumanity, 
spoliation and desolation are being continued w^hich they 
justly look upon with horror and with burning hearts. 

It is necessary, also, in order that there may be no pos- 
sibility of misunderstanding, that the President should very 
solemnly call the attention of the Government of Germany 
to the language and plain intent of one of the terms of 
peace which the German Government has now accepted. It 
is contained in the address of the President delivered at 
Mount Vernon on the Fourth of July last. 

It is as follows: 'The destruction of every arbitrary power 
anywhere that can separately, secretly and of its single choice 
disturb the peace of the world; or, if it cannot be presently 
destroyed, at least its reduction to virtual impotency. The 
power which has hitherto controlled the German nation is of 
the sort here described. It is within the choice of the German 
nation to alter it." The President's words just quoted 
naturally constitute a condition precedent to peace, if peace 



286 ADDRESSES OF" PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 ' 

is to come by the action of the German people themselves. 
The President feels bound to say that the whole process of I 
peace will, in his judgment, depend ;upon the definiteness j 
and the satisfactory character of the guarantees which can i 
be given in this fundamental matter. It is indispensable \ 
that the Governments associated against Germany should 1 
know beyond a peradventure with whom they are dealing. i 

Boston Herald, Oct 15, 19 18. j 



92. THE ARMISTICE WITH GERMANY 

(November 11, 19 18) 
Address to Congress 

In these times of rapid and stupendous change it will in 
some degree lighten my sense of responsibility to perform in 
person the duty of communicating to you some of the larger 
circumstances of the situation with which it is necessary to 
deal. 

The German authorities, who have at the invitation 0^ the 
Supreme War Council been in communication with Marshal 
Foch, have accepted and signed the terms of armistice which 
he was authorized and instructed to communicate to them. 
These terms are as follows: * * * 

The war thus comes to an end ; for, having accepted these 
terms of armistice, it will be impossible for the German com- 
mand to renew it. 

It is not now possible to assess the consequences of 
this great consummation. We know only that this tragical 
war, whose consuming flames swept from one nation to 
another until all the world was on fire, is at an end and 
that it was the privilege of our own people to enter it at its 
most critical juncture in such fashion and in such force as to 
contribute, in a way of which we are all deeply proud, to the 
great result. We know, too, that the object of the war is 
attained; the object upon which all free men had set their 
hearts; and attained with a sweeping completeness which 
even now we do not realize. Armed imperialism such as 



Nov. ii] THE ARMISTICE WITH GERMANY 287 

the men conceived who were but yesterday the masters of 
Germany is at an end, its illicit ambitions engulfed in black 
disaster. Who will now seek to revive it? 

The arbitrary power of the military caste of Germany 
which once could secretly and of its own single choice dis- 
turb the peace of the world is discredited and destroyed. 
And more than that — much m.ore than that — has been ac- 
complished. The great nations which associated themselves 
to destroy it have now definitely united in the common pur- 
pose to set up such a peace as will satisfy the longing of the 
whole world for disinterested justice, embodied in settlements 
which are based upon something much better and more last- 
ing than the selfish competitive interests of powerful States. 
There is no longer conjecture as to the objects the victors 
have in mind. They have a mind in the matter, not only, 
but a heart also. Their avowed and concerted purpose is to 
satisfy and protect the weak as well as to accord their just 
rights to the strong. 

The humane temper and intention of the victorious Gov- 
ernments have already been manifested in a very practical 
way. Their representatives in the Supreme War Council at 
Versailles have by unanimous resolution assured the peoples 
of the Central Empires that everything that is possible in 
the circumstances will be done to supply them with food 
and relieve the distressing want that is in so many places 
threatening their very lives; and steps are to be taken imme- 
diately to organize these efforts at relief in the same sys- 
tematic manner that they were organized in the case of 
Belgium. By the use of the idle tonnage of the Central 
Empires it ought presently to be possible to lift the fear of 
utter misery from their oppressed populations and set their 
minds and energies free for the great and hazardous tasks of 
political reconstruction which now face them on every hand. 
Hunger does not breed reform; it breeds madness and all 
the ugly distempers that make an ordered life impossible. 
For with the fall of the ancient Governments, which rested 
likei an incubus on the peoples of the Central Empires, has 
come political change not merely, but revolution; and revo- 
lution which seems as yet to assume no final and ordered 
form,, biit to run from one 'fluid change to another, until 



288 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

thoughtful men are forced to ask themselves, with what gov- 
ernments and of what sort are we about to deal in the making 
of the covenants of peace? With what authority will they 
meet us, and with what assurance that their authority will 
abide and sustain securely the international arrangements 
into v/hich we are about to enter? There is here matter for 
no small anxiety and misgiving. When peace is made, upon 
whose promises and engagements besides cur own is it to 
rest? 

Let us be perfectly frank with ourselves and admit that 
these questions cannot be satisfactorily answered now or at 
once. But the moral is not that there is little hope of an 
early ansv;er that will suffice. It is only that we must be 
patient and helpful and mindful above all of the great hope 
and confidence that lie at the heart of what is taking place. 
Excesses accomplish nothing. Unhappy Russia has furnished 
abundant recent proof of that. Disorder immediately de- 
feats itself. If excesses should occur, if disorder should for 
a time raise its head, a sober second thought will follow and 
a day of constructive action, if we help and do not hinder. 

The present and all that it holds belongs to the nations 
and the peoples who preserve their self-control and the or- 
derly processes of their Governments; the future to those 
who prove themselves the true friends of mankind. To con- 
quer with arms is to make only a temporary conquest; to 
conquer the world by earning its esteem is to make perma- 
nent conquest. I am confident that the nations that have 
learned the discipline of freedom and that have settled with 
self-possession to its ordered practice are now about to make 
conquest of the world by the sheer power of example and of 
friendly helpfulness. 

The peoples who have but just come out from under the 
yoke of arbitrary government and who are now coming at 
last into their freedom will never find the treasures of liberty 
they are in search of if they look for them by the light of the 
torch. They mil find that every pathway that is stained 
with the blood of their own brothers leads to the wilderness, 
not to the seat of their hope. They are now face to face 
with their initial test. We must hold the light steady until 
tliey find themselves. And in the meantime, if it be possible, 



Nov. 1 1 ] THE ARMISTICE WITH GERMANY 289 

we must establish a peace that will justly define their place 
among the nations, remove all fear of their neighbors and of 
their former masters, di.a eiia.b;e thc-ai lo live in security 
and contentment when they have 5.et their own affairs in 
order. I, for one, do not doubt their purpose or their 
capacity. There are some happy signs that they know and 
will choose the way of self-control and peaceful accommo- 
dation. If they do, we shall put our aid at their disposal in 
every way that we can. If '^nty do not. •■ e r- ■■-■.': .vv. :^: .vith 
patience and sympathy the awakening and recovery that 
will assuredly come at last. 

New York Times, Nov. 12, 19 18. 

93. ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD* 

(December 2, 1918) 
Address to Congress 

The year that has elapsed since I last stood before you to 
fulfill my constitutional duty to give Congress from time to 
time information on the state of the Union has been so 
crowded vvith great events, great processes, and great results, 
that I cannot hope to give you an adequate picture of its 
transactions or of the far-reaching changes which have been 
wrought in the life of our nation and of the world. You 
have yourselves witnessed these things, as I have. It is too 
soon to assess them ; and we who stand in the midst of them 
and are part of them are less qualified than men of another 
generation will be to say what they mean, or even what they 
have been. But some great outstanding facts are unmis- 
takable, and constitute in a sense part of the public business 
with vrhich it is our duty to deal. To state them is to set 
the stage for the legislative and executive action which must 
grow out of them, and which we have yet to shape and 
determine. 

A year ago we had sent 145,198 men overseas. Since then 

* This message was added while this volume was partly in 
type. It is not referred to in any way in the Index. 



290 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

we have sent 1,950,513, an average of 162,542 each month, 
the number, in fact, rising in May last to 245,951, in June 
to 278,850, in July to 307,182, and continuing to reach 
similar figures in August and September — in August 289,570, 
and in September 257,438. No such movement of troops 
ever took place before across 3,000 miles of sea, followed by 
adequate equipment and supplies, and carried safely through 
extraordinary dangers of attack — dangers which were alike 
strange and infinitely difficult to guard against. In all this 
movement only 758 men were lost by enemy attacks — 630 of 
whom were upon a single English transport which was sunk 
near the Orkney Islands. 

I need not tell you what lay back of this great movement 
of men and material. It is net invidious to say that back 
of it lay a supporting organization of the industries of the 
country and of all its productive activities more complete, 
more thorough in method and effective in results, more 
spirited and unanimous in purpose and effort than any other 
great belligerent had ever been able to effect. We profited 
greatly by the experience of the nations which had already 
been engaged for nearly three years in the exigent and exact- 
ing business, their every resource and every executive pro- 
ficiency taxed to the utmost. We were the pupils. But we 
learned quickly and acted with a promptness and readiness 
of cooperation that justify our great pride that we were able 
to serve the world with unparalleled energy and quick accom- 
plishment. 

But it is not the physical scale and executive efficiency of 
preparation, supply, equipment, and despatch that I would 
dwell upon, but the mettle and quality of the officers and 
men we sent over and of the sailors who kept the seas, and 
the spirit of the nation that stood behind them. No soldiers 
or sailors ever proved themselves more quickly ready for 
the test of battle or acquitted themselves with more splendid 
courage and achievement when put to the test. Those of 
us who played some part in directing the great processes by 
which the war was pushed irresistibly forward to the final 
triumph may now forget all that and delight our thoughts 
with the story of what our m.en did. Their officers under- 
stood the grim and exacting task they had undertaken and 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING \BROAD 291 

performed it with an audacity, efficiency, and unhesitating 
courage tliat touch the story of convoy and battle with im- 
perishable distinction at every turn, whether the enterprises 
were great or small — from their chiefs, Pershing and Sims, 
down to the youngest lieutenant; and their men were worthy 
of them— such men as hardly need to be commanded, and go 
to their terrible adventure blithely and with the quick intel- 
ligence of those who know just w^hat it is they would accom- 
plish. I am proud to be the fellow-countryman of men of 
such stuff and valor. Those of us who stayed at home did 
our duty; the war could not have been won or the gallant 
men who fought it given their opportunity to \vin it other- 
wise, but for many a long day we shall think ourselves 
"accurs'd we w^ere not there, and hold our manhood cheap 
while any speaks that fought" with these at St. Mihiel or 
Thierry. The m.emory of those days of triumphant battle 
will go with these fortunate men to their graves; and each 
will have his favorite memory. "Old men forget; yes, all 
shall be forgot, but he'll remember with advantages w^hat 
feats he did that day." 

What we all thank God for with deepest gratitude is that 
our men went in force into the line of battle just at the 
critical moment when the whole fate of the world seemed 
to hang in the balance, and threw their fresh strength into 
the ranks of freedom in time to turn the whole tide and 
sweep of the fateful struggle — turn it once for all, so that 
thenceforth it was back, back for their enemies, always 
back, never again forward. After that it was only a scant 
four months before the commanders of the Central Empires 
knew themselves beaten, and now their very empires are in 
liquidation. 

And throughout it all, how fine the spirit of the nation 
was, what unity of purpose, what untiring zeal, what eleva- 
tion of purpose ran through all its splendid display of 
strength, its untiring accomplishment. I have said that those 
of us who stayed at home to do the work of organization and 
supply will always wish that we had been with the men 
whom we sustained by our labor; but we can never be 
ashamed. It has been an inspiring thing to be here in the 
midst of fine men who had turned aside from every private 



292 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

interest of their own and devoted the whole of their trained 
capacity to the tasks that suppHed the sinews of the whole 
great undertaking. The patriotism, the unselfishness, the 
thoroughgoing devotion and distinguished capacity that 
marked their toilsome labors day after day, month after 
month, have made them fit mates and comrades of the men 
in the trenches and on the sea. And not the men here in 
Washington only. They have but directed the vast achieve- 
ment. Throughout innumerable factories, upon innumerable 
farms, in the depths of coal mines and iron mines and copper 
mines, wherever the stuffs of industry were to be obtained 
and prepared, in the shipyards, on the railways, at the docks, 
on the sea, in every labor that was needed to sustain the 
battle lines, men have vied \Yith each other to do their part, 
and do it well. They can look any man at arms in the face 
and say. We also strove to win and gave the best that was 
in us to rnake our fleets and armies sure of their triumph. 

And what shall we say of the women — of their instant intel- 
ligence, quickening every task that they touched ; their capac- 
ity for organization and cooperation, which gave their action 
discipline and enhanced the effectiveness of everything they 
attempted; their aptitude at tasks to which they had never 
before set their hands; their utter self-sacrifice alike in what 
they did and in what they gave? Their contribution to the 
great result is beyond appraisal. They have added a new 
lustre to the annals of American womanhood. 

The least tribute we can pay them is to make them the 
equals of men in political rights, as they have proved them- 
selves their equals in every field of practical work they have 
entered, whether for themselves or for their country. These 
great days of completed achievements would be sadly marred 
were we to omit that act of justice. Besides the immense 
practical services they have rendered, the women of the 
country have been moving spirits in the systematic economies 
by which our people have voluntarily assisted to supply the 
suffering peoples of the world and the armies of every front 
with food and everything else that we had that would ser\'e 
the common cause. The details of such a story can never be 
fully written, but we carry them at our hearts, and thank 
God that we can say that we are the kinsmen of such. 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD 293 

And now we are sure of the great triumph for which every 
sacrifice was made. It has come — come in its completeness, 
and with the pride and inspiration of these days of achieve- 
ment quick within us, we turn to the tasks of peace again — a 
peace secure against the violence of irresponsible monarchs 
and ambitious military coteries, and made ready for a new 
order, for new^ foundations of justice and fair dealing. 

We are about to give order and organization to this peace, 
not only for ourselves but for the other peoples of the world 
as well, so far as they will suffer us to serve them. It is 
international justice that we seek, not domestic safety merely. 
Our thoughts have dwelt of late upon Europe, upon Asia, 
upon the Near and the Far East, very little upon the acts 
of peace and accommodation that wait to be performed at 
our own doors. While w^e are adjusting our relations with 
the rest of the world, is it not of capital im.portance that w^e 
should clear aw^ay all grounds of misunderstanding with our 
immediate neighbors and give proof of the friendship we 
really feel? I hope that the m.embers of the Senate will 
permit me to speak once more of the unratified treaty of 
adjustment with the Republic of Colombia. I very earnestly 
urge upon them an early and favorable action upon that 
vital matter. I believe that they will feel, with me, that the 
stage of affairs is now set for such action as \^^ll be not only 
just but generous, and in the spirit of the new age upon 
which we have so happily entered. 

So far as our domestic affairs are concerned, the problem 
of our return to peace is a problem of economic and indus- 
trial readjustment. That problem is less serious for us than 
it may turn out to be for the nations which have suffered 
the disarrangements and the losses of the war longer than 
w^e. Our people, moreover, do not wait to be coached and 
led. They know their own business, are quick and resource- 
ful at every readjustment, definite in purpose, and self- 
reliant in action. Any leading strings we might seek to put 
them in would speedily become hopelessly tangled, because 
they would pay no attention to them, and go their own way. 
All that we can do as their legislative and executive servants 
is to mediate the process of change here, there, and else- 
where, as we may. I have heard much counsel as to the 



294 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 \ 

i 
plans that should be formed, and personally conducted to a 
happy consummation, but from no quarter have I seen any 
general scheme of "reconstruction" emerge which 1 thought 
it likely we could force our spirited business men and self- 
reliant laborers to accept with due pliancy and obedience. 

While the war lasted we set up many agencies by which 
to direct the industries of the country in the services it was ; 
necessary for them to render, by which to make sure of an 
abundant supply of the materials needed, by which to check I 
undertakings that could for the time be dispensed with, and I 
stimulate those that were most ser\^iceable in war, by which I 
to gain for the purchasing departments of the government a 
certain control over the prices of essential articles and ma- 
terials, by Vv'hich to restrain trade with alien enemies, make 
the most of the available shipping, and systematize financial 
transactions, both public and private, so that there would be 
no unnecessary conflict or confusion — by which, in short, 
to put every material energy of the country in harness to 
draw the common load and make of us one team in the ac- | 
complishment of a great task. But the moment we knew | 
the armistice to have been signed we took the harness off. j 
Raw materials, upon which the Government had kept its 
hand for fear there should not be enough for the industries 
that supplied the armies, have been released and put into 
the general market again. Great industrial plants whose 
whole output and machinery had been taken over for the uses 
of the Government have been set free to return to the uses to 
which they were put before the war. It has not been pos- 
sible to remove so readily or so quickly the control of food- 
stuffs and of shipping, because the world has still to be fed 
from our granaries and the ships are still needed to send 
supplies to our men overseas, and to bring the men back as | 
fast as the disturbed conditions on the other side of the 1 
v;ater permit. But even these restraints are being relaxed as | 
much as possible, and more and more as the weeks go by. j 

Never before have there been agencies in existence in this ^ 
country which knew so much of the field of supply, of labor, 1 
and of industry as the War Industries Board, the War Trade 
Board, the Labor Department, the Food Administration, | 
and the Fuel Administration have known since the labors I 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOLNG ABROAD 295 

became thoroughly systematized, and they have not been iso- 
lated agencies. They have been directed by men that rep- 
resented the permanent departments of the Government, and 
so have been the centers of unified and cooperative action. 
It has been the policy of the Executive, therefore, since the 
armistice (which is in effect a complete submission of the 
enemy), to put the knowledge of these bodies at the disposal 
of the business men of the country, and to offer their intel- 
ligent mediation at every point and in every matter where 
it was desired. It is surprising how fast the process of re- 
turn to a peace footing has moved in the three weeks since 
the fighting stopped. It promises to outrun any inquiry that 
may be instituted and any aid that may be offered. It will 
not be easy to direct it any better than it will direct itself. 
The American business man is of quick initiative. 

The ordinary and normal processes of private initiative will 
not, however, provide immediate employment for all of the 
men of our returning armies. Those who are of trained ca- 
pacity, those who are skilled workmen, those who have ac- 
quired familiarity with established businesses, those who are 
ready and willing to go to the farms, all those whose apti- 
tudes are kno\ATi or will be sought out by employers, will 
find no difficulty, it is safe to say, in finding place and em- 
ployment. But there will be others who will be at a loss 
where to gain a livelihood unless pains are taken to guide 
them and put them in the way of work. There will be a 
large floating residuum of labor which should not be left 
wholly to shift for itself. It seems to me important, there- 
fore, that the development of public works of every sort 
should be promptly resumed, in order that opportunities 
should be created for unskilled labor in particular, and that 
plans should be made for such developments of our unused 
lands and our natural resources as we have hitherto lacked 
stimulation to undertake. 

I particularly direct your attention to the very practical 
plans which the Secretary of the Interior has developed in 
his annual report, and before your committees for the recla- 
mation of arid, swamp, and cut-over lands, which might, if 
the States were willing and able to cooperate, redeem some 
three hundred million acres of land for cultivation. There 



296 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

are said to be fifteen or twenty million acres of land in the 
West, at present arid, for whose reclamation water is avail- 
able, if properly conserved. There are about two hundred 
and thirty m.illion acres from which the forests have been cut, 
but which have never yet been cleared for the plow, and 
which lie waste and desolate. These lie scattered all over 
the Union. And there are nearly eighty million acres of 
land that lie under swamps or subject to periodical overflow, 
or too wet for anything but grazing, which it is perfectly 
feasible to drain and protect and redeem. The Congress can 
at once direct thousands of the returning soldiers to the recla- 
mation of the arid lands which it has already undertaken, 
if it will but enlarge the plans and the appropriations which 
it has intrusted to the Department of the Interior. It is 
possible in dealing with our unused land to effect a great 
rural and agricultural development, which will afford the 
best sort of opportunity to men who want to help themselves, 
and the Secretary of the Interior has thought the possible 
methods out in a way which is worthy of your most friendly 
attention. 

I have spoken of the control which must yet for a while, 
perhaps for a long time, be exercised over shipping because 
of priority of service to which our forces overseas are entitled 
and which should also be accorded the shipments which are 
to save recently liberated peoples from starvation and many 
devastated regions from permanent ruin. May I not say a 
special word about the needs of Belgium and Northern 
France? No sums of money paid by way of indemnity will 
serve of themselves to save them from hopeless disadvantage 
for years to come. Something more must be done than merely 
find the money. 

If they had money and raw materials in abundance to- 
morrow, they could not resume their place in the industry of 
the world to-morrow — ^the very important place they held 
before the flame of war swept across them. Many of their 
factories are razed to the ground. Much of their machinery 
is destroyed or has been taken away. Their people are 
scattered, and many of their best workmen are dead. Their 
markets will be taken by others, if they are not in some spe- 
cial way assisted to rebuild their factories and replace their 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD 297 

lost instruments of manufacture. They should not be left 
to the vicissitudes of the sharp competition for materials and 
for industrial facilities which is now to set in. 

I hope, therefore, that the Congress will not be unwilling, 
if it should become necessary, to grant to some such agency 
as the War Trade Board the right to establish priorities of 
export and supply for the benefit of these people whom we 
have been so happy to assist in saving from the German 
terror and whom we must not now thoughtlessly leave to 
shift for themselves in a pitiless competitive market. 

For the steadying and facilitation of our own domestic 
business readjustments nothing is more important than the 
immediate determination of the taxes that are to be levied 
for 19 1 8, 19 19, and 1920. As much of the burden of tax- 
ation must be lifted from business as sound methods of fi- 
nancing the Government will permit, and those who conduct 
the great essential industries of the country must be told as 
exactly as possible what obligations to the Government they 
will be expected to meet in the years immediately ahead of 
them; it will be of serious consequence to the country to 
delay removing all uncertainties in this matter a single day 
longer than the right processes of debate justify. It is idle 
to talk of successful and confident business reconstruction 
before those uncertainties are resolved. 

If the war had continued it would have been necessary to 
raise at least $8,000,000,000 by taxation payable in the 
year 1 9 1 9 ; but the war . has ended and I agree with the 
Secretary of the Treasury that it will be safe to reduce the 
amount to six billions. An immediate rapid decline in the 
expenses of the Government is not to be looked for. Con- 
tracts made for war supplies will, indeed, be rapidly canceled 
and liquidated, but their immediate liquidation will make 
hea\y drains on the Treasury for the months just ahead of 
us. 

The maintenance of our forces on the other side of the 
sea is still necessary. A considerable proportion of those 
forces must remain in Europe during the period of occupa- 
tion, and those which are brought home will be transported 
and demobilized at heavy expense for months to come. The 
interest on our war debt must, of course, be paid and pro- 



298 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

vision made for the retirement of the obligations of the Gov- 
ernment which represent it. But these demancfs will, of 
course, fall much below what a continuation of military oper- 
ations would have entailed, and six billions should suffice to 
supply a sound foundation for the financial operations of the 
year. 

I entirely concur with the Secretary of the Treasury in 
recommending that the two billions needed in addition to the 
four billions provided by existing law be obtained from the 
profits which have accrued and shall accrue from war con- 
tracts and distinctively war business, but that these taxes 
be confined to the war profits accruing in 19 18 or in 19 19 
from business originating in war contracts. I urge your 
acceptance of his recommendation that provision be made 
now, not subsequently, that the taxes to be paid in 1920 
should be reduced from six to four billions. Any arrange- 
ments less definite than these would add elements of doubt 
and confusion to the critical period of industrial readjust- 
ment through which the country must now immediately pass, 
and which no true friend of the nation's essential business 
interests can afford to be responsible for creating or pro- 
longing. Clearly determined conditions, clearly and simply 
charted, are indispensable to the economic revival and rapid 
industrial development which may confidently be expected, 
if we act now and sweep all interrogation points away. 

I take it for granted that the Congress will carry out the 
naval program which was undertaken before we entered the 
war. The Secretary of the Navy has submitted to your com^ 
mittees for authorization that part of the program which 
covers the building plans of the next three years. These 
plans have been prepared along the lines and in accordance 
with the policy which the Congress established, not under 
the exceptional conditions of the war, but with the intention 
of adhering to a definite method of development for the navy. 
I earnestly recommend the uninterrupted pursuit of that 
policy. It would clearly be unwise for us to attempt to 
adjust our program to a future world policy as yet undeter- 
mined. 

The question which causes me the greatest concern is the 
question of the policy to be adopted toward the railroads. I 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD 299 

frankly turn to you for counsel upon it. I have no confident 
judgment of my o\vc\. I do not see how any thoughtful man 
can have who knows anything of the complexity of the prob- 
lem. It is a problem which must be studied, studied immedi- 
ately, and studied without bias or prejudice. Nothing can 
be gained by becoming partisans of any particular plan of 
settlement. 

It was necessary that the administration of the railways 
should be taken over by the Government so long as the war 
lasted. It would have been impossible otherwise to establish 
and carry through under a single direction the necessary 
priorities of shipment. It would have been impossible other- 
wise to combine maximum production at the factories and 
mines and farms with the maximum possible car supply to 
move the products to the ports and markets; impossible to 
route troop shipments and freight shipments without regard 
to the ad\^antage of the roads employed; impossible to sub- 
ordinate, when necessary, all questions of convenience to the 
public necessity; impossible to give the necessary financial 
support to the roads from the public treasury. But all these 
necessities have now been served, and the question is, WTiat 
is best for the railroads and for the public in the future? 

Exceptional circumstances and exceptional methods of 
administration were not needed to convince us that the rail- 
roads were not equal to the immense tasks of transportation 
imposed upon them by the rapid and continuous develop- 
ments of the industries of the country. We knew that al- 
ready. And we knew that they w^ere unequal to it partly 
because their full cooperation was rendered impossible by 
law and their competition made obligatory, so that it has 
been impossible to assign to them severally the traffic which 
could best be carried by their respective lines in the interest 
of expedition and national economy. 

"We may hope, I believe, for the formal conclusion of the 
war by a treaty by the time Spring has come. The twenty- 
one months to which the present control of the railways is 
limited, after formal proclamation of peace shall have been 
made, will run at the farthest, I take it for granted, only to 
the January of 192 1. The full equipment of the railways 
which the Federal Administration had planned could not be 



300 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 i 

completed within any such period. The present law does not 
permit the use of the revenues of the several roads for the 
execution of such plans except by formal contract with their 
Directors, some of whom will consent while some \\i\\ not, 
and therefore does not afford sufficient authority to under- 
take improvements upon the scale upon which it would be 
necessary to undertake them. Every approach to this diffi- 
cult subject-matter of decision brings us face to face, there- 
fore, with this unanswered question: What is it right that 
we should do v»dth the railroads, in the interest of the public 
and in fairness to their owners? Let me say at once that I 
have no answer ready. The only thing tiat is perfectly 
clear to me is that it is not fair either to the public or to the 
owners of the railroads to leave the question unanswered, 
and that it will presently become my duty to relinquish con- 
trol of the roads, even before the expiration of the statuory 
period, unless there should appear some clear prospect in the 
meantime of a legislative solution. Their release would at 
least produce one "element of a solution, namely, certainty 
and a quick stimulation of private initiative. 

I believe that it will be serviceable for me to set forth as 
explicitly as possible the alternative courses that lie open to 
our choice. We can simply release the roads and go back to 
the old conditions of private management, unrestricted com- 
petition, and multiform regulation by both State and Federal 
authorities; or we can go to the opposite extreme and estab- 
lish complete control, accompanied, if necessary, by actual 
Government ownership; or we can adopt an intermediate 
course of modified private control, under a more unified and 
affirmative public regulation and under such alterations of 
the law as will permit wasteful competition to be avoided 
and a considerable degree of unification of administration 
to be effected, as, for example, by regional corporations, under 
which the railways of definable areas would be in effect 
combined in single systems. 

The one conclusion that I am ready to state with confidence 
is that it would be a disservice alike to the country and to 
the owners of the railroads to return to the old conditions 
unmodified. Those are conditions of restraint without de- 
velopment. There is nothing affirmative or helpful about 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD 301 

them. WTiat the country chiefly needs is that all its means 
of transportation should be developed, its railways, its water- 
ways, its highways, and its countryside roads. Some new 
element of policy, therefore, is absolutely necessary — neces- 
sary for the service of the public, necessary for the release 
of credit to those who are administering the railways, neces- 
sary for the protection of their security holders. The old 
policy may be changed much or little, but surely it cannot 
always be left as it was. I hope that the Congress will have 
a complete and impartial study of the whole problem insti- 
tuted at once and prosecuted as rapidly as possible. I stand 
ready and anxious to release the roads from the present con- 
trol, and I must do so at a very early date, as by waiting 
until the statutory limit of time is reached I shall be merely 
prolonging the period of doubt and uncertainty which is 
hurtful to ever\r interest concerned. 

I welcome this occasion to announce to the Congress my 
purpose to join in Paris the representatives of the Govern- 
ments with which we have been associated in the war against 
the Central Empires for the purpose of discussing with them 
the main features of the treaty of peace. I realize the great 
inconveniences that will attend my leaving the country, par- 
ticularly at this time, but the conclusion that it was my para- 
mount duty to go has been forced upon me by considerations 
which I hope will seem as conclusive to you as they have 
seemed to me. 

The Allied Governments have accepted the bases of peace 
which I outlined to the Congress on the 8th of January last, 
as the Central Empires also have, and very reasonably desire 
my personal counsel in their interpretation and application, 
and it is highly desirable that I should give it in order that 
the sincere desire of our Government to contribute without 
selfish purpose of any kind to settlements that will be of 
common benefit to all the nations concerned may be made 
fully manifest. The peace settlements which are now to be 
agreed upon are of transcendent importance, both to us and 
to the rest of the world, and I know of no business or in- 
terest which should take precedence of them. The gallant 
men of our armed forces on land and sea have conspicuously 
fought for the ideals which they knew to be the ideals of 



302 ADDRESSES OF PRESIDENT WILSON [1918 

their country. I have sought to express those ideals; they 
have accepted my statements of them as the substance of 
their own thought and purpose, as the associated Govern- 
ments have accepted them; I owe it to them to see to it, so 
far as in me lies, that no false or mistaken interpretation is 
put upon them, and no possible effort omitted to realize them. 
It is now my duty to play my full part in making good what 
they offered their life's blood to obtain. I can think of no 
call to service which would transcend this. 

I shall be in close touch with you and with affairs on this 
side of the water, and you will know all that I do. At my 
request the French and English Governments have abso- 
lutely removed the censorship of cable news which until 
within a fortnight they had maintained, and there is now no 
censorship whatever exercised at this end, except upon at- 
tempted trade communications with enemy countries. It 
has been necessary to keep an open wire constantly available 
between Paris and the Department of State, and another be- 
tween France and the Department of War. In order that 
this might be done with the least possible interference with 
the other uses of the cables, I have temporarily taken over 
the control of both cables in order that they may be used 
as a single system. I did so at the advice of the most ex- 
perienced cable officials, and I hope that the results will 
justify my hope that the news of the next few months may 
pass with the utmost freedom, and with the least possible 
delay from each side of the sea to the other. 

May I now hope, gentlemen of the Congress, that in the 
delicate tasks I shall have to perform on the other side of 
the sea, in my efforts truly and faithfully to interpret the 
principles and purposes of the country we love, I may have 
the encouragement and the added strength of your united 
support? I realize the magnitude and difficulty of the duty 
I am undertaking. I am poignantly aware of its grave re- 
sponsibilities. I am the servant of the nation. I can have 
no private thought or purpose of my own in performing such 
an errand. I go to give the best that is in me to the common 
settlements which I must now assist in arriving at in con- 
ference with the other working heads of the associated Gov- 
ernments. I shall count upon your friendly countenance and 



Dec. 2] ADDRESS BEFORE GOING ABROAD 303 

encouragement. I shall not be inaccessible. The cables 
and the wireless will render me available for any counsel 
or service you may desire of me, and I shall be happy in 
the thought that I am constantly in touch with the weighty 
matters of domestic policy vvith which we shall have to deal. 
I shall make my absence as brief as possible, and shall hope 
to return with the happy assurance that it has been possible 
to translate into action the great ideals for which America 
has striven. 

N^w York Times, December 3, 19 18. 



INDEX 



Agriculture, reform, 3-4; im- 
portance of, 252-253; De- 
partment, 73; war-time, 199- 
201; message to farmers, 
251-255 ; governmental war- 
time promotion, 252-253; or- 
ganizations, 253; loans, 253; 
fertilization and seed, 253; 
labor problem, 253-254; re- 
sponse to war demands, 254; 
further demands on, 254, 255 ; 
price regulation, 255. See 
also Industry. 

Albert of Belgium, message 
to, 231-232. 

Allegiance, meaning of oath, 
86, 130. 

Alliances, American attitude, 
30; and essentials of peace, 
178, 279; entangling, and 
League of Nations, 280. See 
also League of Nations. 

Alsace - Lorraine, restoration 
to France, 249. 

America First, address on, 
78-83. 

American Bar Association, 
address before, 46-48. 

American Federation of La- 
bor, address before, 226-230. 

American Revolution, prin- 
ciples, 28-32. 

Americanism, elements, 130. 
See also Democracy. 

Annapolis, address at, 36-39. 

"Arabic," sinking, 114. 

Arbitration, international, and 
Pan-Americanism, 99-100. 

Arbitration, labor, rejected in 



railroad question, 144, 147; 
limitations, 147; compulsory, 
149; judicial enforcement of 
awards, 149-15© ; war-time, 
229-230. 

Arlington, addresses at, 32-36, 
209-210. 

Armaments, limitation in 
peace terms, 177, 186, 248. 

Armed merchantmen, travel 
on, 109; status and German 
policy, 113-114. 

Armed neutrality, policy, 182- 
183, 185; impracticable, 190. 

Armistice, despatches on, 283- 
286; withdrawal of German 
forces, 284 ; character of Ger- 
man government, 284-286 ; 
guarantee of military suprem- 
acy, 284; as military affair, 
284; and inhumanity and 
devastation, 285 ; announce- 
ment to Congress, 286-289; 
finality, 286. 

Arms, exportation, and neu- 
trality, 84-85. 

Army, American, self-sacrifice 
and courage of soldier, 33- 
34, 75; and industrial pre- 
paredness, 102; Mexican ex- 
pedition, 110-111; address to 
West Point graduates, 125- 
131; former service of offi- 
cers, 126; possibilities of 
present service, 126, 131 ; and 
militarism, 128; officers as 
citizens, 129; officers and 
Americanism, 125-131 ; and 
World War, 197 ; message to 



305 



3o6 



INDEX 



drafted men, 222-223; draft 
and farm labor, 253-254; 
message to student corps, 
282-283. See also Arma- 
ments ; Militarism ; Prepar- 
edness. 

Associated Press, address be- 
fore, 78-83; power, 78; and 
public opinion, 82-83. 

Associated Workers of the 
World, and anarchy, 230. 

Atlantic City, address at, 154- 
157. 

Austria - Hungary, American 
attitude toward, 195-196; as 
Germany's tool, 213, 214 ; and 
peace conditions, 235, 249; 
war with, advised, 237-238; 
rejection of conference pro- 
posed by, 275; revolution in, 
287-289. See also Peace; 
World War. 

Autocracy, designs and World 
War, 193, 205, 212-214, 220, 
273 ; and peace concert, 193 ; 
spies and intrigues, 194, 211- 
212, 216; deceitful peace 
drives, 206-207, 214-216, 228, 
234, 244, 256-257; and status 
quo ante, 207, 220-221; des- 
peration, 214-215 ; no peace 
with, 221-222; 233, 277, 284, 
285 ; overthrow essential to 
peace, 268 ; as issue of the 
war, 276-277 ; overthrown, 
287. See also Militarism. 

Balance of Power, and per- 
manent peace, 174-175, 186, 
208. 

Balfour, Minister, and resto- 
ration of Palestine, 272. 

Balkans, deliverance, 235; in 
peace terms, 249. See also 
Middle Europe Empire; Na- 
tions by Name. 

Baltimore, address at, 157- 
162. 

''anking, American, reform, 
H ; Federal Reserve, 133, 136 ; 



and foreign exchange, 158- 

159; loans to farmers, 253. 

See also Business; Finances. 

Barry, John, address at statue 

of, 28-32. 
Belgian relief, German viola- 
tions, 189. 
Belgium, message of sympa- 
thy, 231-232 ; reparation, 235 ; 
essentials in peace terms, 248- 
249. See also Peace; World 
War. 
Berlin-Bagdad Railroad, pur- 
pose, 228. 
Bible, reading by soldiers, 217- 

218. 
Bonds, purchase, 258 ; fourth 
loan, 275. See also Finances. 
Boundary disputes, and Pan- 
Americanism, 99. 
JBrandeis, L. D., qualifications 
for Supreme Court Justice, 
117-120. 
Brest - Litovsk negotiations, 

244. 
Bryan, Secretary, communica- 
tions through, 83-85, 89-90. 
Buffalo, address at, 226-230. 
Bulgaria, American attitude 
toward, 196, 238; as German 
tool, 213, 214. See also Bal- 
kans ; World War. 
Bureau of Foreign and Do- 
mestic Commerce, work, 74- 
75. 
Bureau of Standards, impor- 
tance, 73. 
Business, reform, 3; work of 
Sixty-third Congress, 55-56; 
problems of neutral, 56-57; 
unlocking of resources, 57- 
58; Democratic Party and 
interests, 66-67 ; democracy, 
132-137 ; conservatism of 
leaders, 132-133, 135-136; 
need of common counsel, 
133-135 ; American timidity in 
international, 137, 162; de- 
velopment of foreign, 157- 
159; policy of future, 159; 



INDEX 



307 



and law, 159; Tariff Com- 
mission and facts, 160; co- 
operation, 160-161 ; with 
Latin-America, 161 ; war-time 
profits, 200. See also Bank- 
ing ; Commerce ; Finances ; 
Industry; Trusts. 

Censorship, need, 205-206. 

Chamber of Commerce of 
United States, address be- 
fore, 70-77. 

Christianity, reason, 50. 

Cincinnati, address at, 162- 
164. 

Citizenship, address to natu- 
ralized citizens, 85-89. See 
also Immigration ; Loyalty ; 
Patriotism, 

Citizenship Convention, ad- 
dress at, 139-143. 

Civics, in schools, 218-219. 

Civil War, meaning of years 
since, 10; and present-day 
tasks, 10 ; veterans and spir- 
itual reunion, 32, 36 ; Con- 
federate monument at Ar- 
lington, 34-36 ; memorial to 
women, 202, 204. See also 
Memorial Day. 

Civilian Advisory Board of 
Navy, address to, 93-94. 

Class divisions, dangers and 
discredit, 166, 230. 

Claxton, Commissioner, and 
patriotic teaching in schools, 
219. 

Cleveland, Grover, apprecia- 
tion, 5-6. 

Coal, war-time problem, 198. 

College, ideals, 14-16; and 
ideals of state, 15; character 
of training, 36, 126 ; and 
breadth of view, 49, 136; 
message to college soldiers, 
282-283. 

Colonies. See Dependencies. 

Commerce, western outlook of 
world, 17 ; influence of Pan- 
ama Canal, 17-18 ; address on 
national, 70-77 ; cooperation, 



70-73 ; governmental inquiry 
and scientific assistance, 73- 
75; information and legisla- 
tion, 75-76 ; freedom as peace 
essential, 248, 279. See also 
Business ; Freedom of the 
Seas ; Merchant Marine ; 
Tariff. 

Committee of Railway Exec- 
utives, work, 238-239, 242. 

Compromise, none, in World 
War, 268, 277-278. See also 
Peace. 

Concessions in Latin Amer- 
ica, 18. 

Confederate monument at 
Arlington, address, 34-36. 

Congress, addresses to : on 
tariff, 6-8 ; on trusts, 22-27 ; 
on tolls on Panama Canal, 
27-28; on foreign trade and 
shipping, 35-60; on eight- 
hour day for railroad men, 
143-150 ; on submarine war- 
fare, 111-117; on conditions 
of peace, 172-179, 244-251; 
on breach with Germany, 
179-183; on war with Ger- 
many, 188-197; on war with 
Austria-Hungary, 232-238 ; on 
government control of rail- 
roads, 241-244 ; on Armistice, 
286-289; work of Sixty-third, 
55-56; veto of immigration 
bill, 67-70. 

Conservation, need, 2-4. 

Conservatism, of Republican 
Party, 62-63; animated, 63; 
of leaders of business, 132- 
133; American, 135-136. 

Consular reports, value, 74. 

Cooperation, in commerce and 
busTness, 70-73, 160-161. 

Courage, of soldier, 34. 

Culberson. Senator, letter to, 
117-120. 

Currency, reform, 3; Federal 
Reserve, 133, 136. 

Dardanelles, in peace terms, 
249. 



3o8 



INDEX 



Daughters of the Confeder- 
acy, and monument at Ar- 
lington, 34-36. 

Declaration of Independence, 
present significance, 39 ; and 
sacrifice, 42. 

Declaration of War, advised, 
against Germany, 191 ; against 
Austria-Hungary, 237-238. 

Defense, preparedness for, 93- 
94. 

Democracy, America and 
world, 20-21, 266-267: and 
mutual understanding, 35 ; 
and international justice, 40- 
44; and equality of opportu- 
nity, 53 ; enthusiasm, 64 ; and 
Democratic Party, 76; and 
purpose of United States, 83, 
127, 129-130; of business, 
132-137; vigor, 150-151; mys- 
tery, 151; justification of 
faith, 151-152; object and 
commands, 154 ; in peace 
terms, 176, 186, 236-237, 248; 
and League of Nations, 193 ; 
v^orld made safe for, 195 ; 
and American war objects, 
192-193, 195, 197, 203, 207, 
209-210 ; and woman suffrage, 
224-226; meaning, 230; and 
international friendship, 260; 
and lynching, 270-271; as 
issue of the war, 277. See 
also Public Opinion. 

Democratic Party, meaning of 
control, 1-5 ; address on, 61- 
67 ; progressiveness, 63 ; 
teamwork, 64; and business 
interests, 66-67 ; and democ- 
racy, 76; results of control, 
184. See also Politics. 

Dependencies, policy, 13, 58-59, 
81; principle, 124; in peace 
terms, 248. 

Detroit, address at, 132-137. 

Directorates, interlocking, 24. 

Dollar Diplomacy, 40. 

Drafted men, message to, 222- 
223. 



Economy, war-time, 201. 

Edison, T. A., letter on TOth 
birthday, 183. 

Education. See College ; 
Schools. 

Egypt, German intrigue, 213. 

Eight-hour day, controversy 
on railroads, 143-150; just- 
ness, 145. 

Equality, of opportunity, 53; 
in foreign relations, 162; of 
nations in peace terms, 175- 
176, 186, 250; of nations as 
issue of the war, 277. 

European War. See World 
War. 

Evolution, moral, 55. 

Exchange, foreign, and Amer- 
ican banks, 158-159. 

Expediency, war policy and 
American honor, 105-109. 

Facts, respect for, 101. 

Farm Loan Banking System, 
253. 

Farmers. See Agriculture. 

Farmers' Conference, message 
to, 251-255. 

Federal Reserve, purpose and 
opposition, 133, 136; and ag- 
ricultural loans, 253. 

Federal Trade Commission, 
suggested, 25. 

Fertilization, government aid, 
253. 

Filibustering, and Pan-Amer- 
icanism, 100, 186. _ 

Finances, of Latin-America, 
18 ; United States as creditor 
nation, 79, 164; foreign ex- 
change, 158-159; war, 191; 
of government control of 
railroads, 243-244. See also 
Banking; Business. 

Flag, symbolism, 37; as em- 
bodiment of experience, 90- 
92 ; as emblem, 210. 

Flag Day, addresses, 90-93; 
210-217. 

Food, war-time problems, 198- 
200, 252; price regulation, 



INDEX 



309 



255 ; for central peoples, 287. 
See also Agriculture. 

Foreign relations, meaning of 
isolation, 30; altruism, 37-39, 
165; United States as world 
power, principles, 39-43, 107- 
109 ; limit to dollar diplo- 
macy, 39-40; confidence in. 
161-162; American, and 
equality, 162 ; society of na- 
tions, 162-164; end of isola- 
tion. 164-165, 280. See also 
Business ; League of Na- 
tions ; Pan - Americanism ; 
Peace ; World War. 

FoRTHRiGHTNESS, in public life, 
62. 

Fourteen Conditions of Peace, 
247-249. 

Fourth Liberty Loan, address 
at opening, 275-283. 

France, greeting to, 217 ; essen- 
tials in peace terms, 248. See 
also Peace ; World War. 

Frankness in peace terms, 246- 
247, 280-282. 

Freedom. See Democracy. 

Freedom of the Seas, right of 
neutrals, 83-84 ; and subma- 
rine warfare, 89-90, 112-116; 
no abridgment, 106-107; 
travel on armed merchant- 
men. 109; war zones, 111-112; 
in peace terms, 177, 186, 248. 
See also Submarines. 

Freight rates, and eight-hour 
controversy, 146, 148. 

Friendship, as international ce- 
ment. 258 ; democracy and 
international, 2G0. 

Fuller, Chief-Justice, on Bran- 
deis, 118. 

Gardens, war, 201. 

Genius, and democracy, 150- 

151. 
German-Americans, and war 

with Germany, 196. See also 

Hyphen. 
German people, and United 

States in World War, 193, 



195, 196, 205, 212. 220, 228; 
and peace terms, 236, 277. 

Germany, antebellum, 226-228; 
internal affairs and peace 
terms, 250; revolution, 287- 
289. See also Autocracy; 
German People; Middle PLu- 
rope Empire ; Peace ; World 
War. 

Gettysburg, address at, 10-13. 

Gompers, Samuel, tribute to, 
229. 

Grain Dealers' Association, 
address before, 157-162. 

Great Britain, treaty and Pan- 
ama Canal tolls, 27-28. See 
also Peace ; W^orld War. 

Gridiron Dinner, address at, 
107-109. 

Health, guarding of national, 
4. 

Heflin, Representative, letter 
to, 204-205. 

Holidays, benefit, 92. 

Hoover, H. C, and patriotic 
teaching in school, 219. 

Hospital ships, sinking, 189. 

Hyphen, and Americanism, 30- 
31, 130; and oath of allegi- 
ance. 86 ; and loyalty, 142 ; 
German-Americans and the 
war, 196. 

Immigration, and American- 
ism, 30-31, 87-88 ; veto of lit- 
eracy test bill, 67-70 ; strength 
from, 85, 88; expectations 
and results to immigrants, 88, 
139-140; and World War, 
101: allegiance. 130; policy. 
137 ; influence of example on 
immigrants, 140-143. 

Imperialism. See Autocracy. 

Inaugural addresses, first, 1- 
5 ; second, 184-188. 

Indemnities, and reparations, 
war, 208, 222. 235, 236, 248- 
249. 

Independence, American, real- 
ity and use, 39-45. 



310 



INDEX 



India, German intrigue, 213. 

Indianapolis, address at, 61-67. 

Industry, preparedness, 102 ; 
war-time problems, 198-201; 
German antebellum subsidy, 
227. See also Agriculture; 
Business ; Labor. 

International law, opinion 
and sanction, 46, 47 ; obedi- 
ence to, as peace term, 268- 
269. See also Freedom of the 
Seas ; Neutrality. 

Interstate Commerce Commis- 
sion, proposed reorganiza- 
tion, 148. 

Intrigue, German, in United 
States, 194-195, 211-212, 216; 
in Mexico, 195, 211, 262. See 
also Autocracy ; World War. 

Inventor, Edison as, 183. 

Isolation, meaning, 30 ; end, 
137, 164-165, 173, 178-179, 185- 
186; and League of Nations, 
280. 

Italy, essential peace terms, 
249. See also Peace; World 
War. 

Jackson, Andrew, forthright- 

ness, 61-62, 66. 
Jackson Day address, 61-67. 
Japan, German intrigue, 211. 
Jews, restoration of Palestine, 

272. 
Junior Red Cross, 223-224. 

Labor, hours in railway service, 
143-150; justness of eight- 
hour day, 145 ; and class dis- 
tinction, 165-166; and the 
war, 229-230, 273-274; farm- 
ers' war problem, 253-254. 
Labor Day Message, 272-274. 
Lamb, Charles, anecdote, 230. 
Lansing, Secretary, communi- 
cations through, 120-121, 219- 
^22, 275, 283-286. 
>in America, address on re- 
ions with, 16-21; and Pan- 
\ Canal, 16-18, 161; ad- 



verse circumstances, 18, 20; 

World War and commercial ! 

dependence, 57 ; business I 

with, 161 : disinterested serv- ] 

ice to, 261-266. See also i 

Mexico ; Monroe Doctrine ; I 

Pan-Americanism. ! 

Law, precedent and moral ' 
judgments, 47-48; purpose, 

141 ; and commerce, 159. See ■ 
also International Law. 

Lawyers' history of the United 

States. 155. ^ ; 

Leaders, character of Ameri- 
can, 91, 108. ; 

League of Nations, in peace ' 

terms, 125, 208, 249, 265, 369, \ 

278; United States and, 173, i 

178-179, 279-280; as issue of | 

the war, 277. j 

League to Enforce Peace, ad- | 

dress to, 121-125. ! 

Lee, R. E., American, 36. ; 

Liberty. See Democracy. ,; 

Lincoln, Abraham, address at 
birthplace, 150-154 ; and de- 
mocracy. 151-152 ; isolation, 
153. 

Lloyd-George, Premier, and [ 

peace, 246. ! 

Lobby, warning on tariff, 9. i 

Loyalty, oath of allegiance, 86, ; 
130; address on, 139-143; ex- 
ample to immigrants, 139-141, i 
143 ; basis, 141 ; and the hy- 1 
phen, 142; meaning, 142. See \ 
also Hyphen; Patriotism; 
Unity. ^ , 

"Lusitania," protest on sink- ' 

ing, 89-90, 114. ; 

Lynching, denunciation. 230, \ 
270-271. 

McAdoo, W. G., to control rail- ! 

roads, 240. ' 

McKinley, William, and pub- 
lic opinion, ii ; and Confed- \ 
erate monument at Arlington, ! 
35. ., 

McLemore resolution, letter , 

on, 109. ^ 



INDEX 



311 



Mediation, position of United 
States, 80-81. 

Memorial Day addresses, 32- 
34, 209-210. 

Merchant marine, need of 
ships, policy, 59-60. 135 ; con- 
vention for safety at sea, 60 ; 
decay, 158 ; war-time build- 
ing, 198, 201. 

Methodist Protestant Church, 
address at conference, 77-78. 

Mexican editors, address to, 
261-266. 

Mexican War, regrets, 264. 

Mexico, internal conditions and 
foreign relations, 40-41 ; 
watchful waiting policy, 64- 
66 ; facts, 72 ; expedition into. 
110-111 ; trouble-makers. 111 ; 
attitude toward United States, 
138 ; border expedition and 
control of railroads, 149 ; 
German intrigue, 195, 211, 
262 ; attitude of disinterested 
service, 261-264 ; false news 
in, 262 ; peace and develop- 
ment, 265-266. See also 
Latin America ; Pan-Ameri- 
canism. 

Middle Europe Empire, and 
German peace drives, 207, 
214-216, 228, 257 ; German de- 
signs and the war, 212-214, 
228; overthrow essential to 
peace, 235. 

Middlemen, and war-time prof- 
its, 200. 

Militancy, extolled, 51-53. 

Militarism, and preparedness, 
101-102, 104, 128-129: spirit, 
128. See also Autocracy. 

Militia, and preparedness, 103. 

Milton, John, on militancy, 51- 
52. 

Mob. See Lynching. 

Mobile, address at, 16-21. 

Monroe Doctrine, and Pan- 
Americanism, 99, 130, 264- 
265; as world doctrine, 178, 
263. 

Montenegro, in peace terms, 



249. See also Balkans, World 
War. 

Morals, cowardice, 52 ; vigi- 
lance, 54 ; evolution. 55. 

Mount Vernon address, 266- 
269. 

Nationality, recognition, in 
peace terms, 176, 186, 208, 221, 
268 ; as issue of the war, 277. 

Naturalization, address to 
new citizens, 85-89 ; character 
of allegiance, 86. See also 
Immigration. 

Navy, address at Annapolis, 36- 
39; education of officers, 36- 
37; ideal of unselfish service, 
37-39; no prejudice against, 
104; and World War. 197. 
See also Armaments. 

Neutral trade. See Freedom 
of the Seas. 

Neutrality, American, appeal 
for, 44-46; basis, 79-80; 
United States as mediating 
nation, 80-81 ; and reserve 
moral force, 81-82, 131; 
rights, despatch to Germany, 
83-85 ; and exportation of 
arms, 84-85 ; impossible in fu- 
ture, 163, 192-193. See also 
Freedom of the Seas ; Sub- 
marines ; World War. 

New York, addresses at, 100- 
105, 256-260, 275-283. 

News, warning against false, 
82-83 ; false, in Mexico, 262. 
See also Associated Press. 

Nobility, American, 33. 

Northwest Loyalty Meetings, 
message to, 231. 

Opportunity, equality in Amer- 
ica, 53 ; and immigration lit- 
eracy test, 68-69. 

Pacific railroad building, 59. 
Palestine, restoration for 

Jews, 272. 
Panama Canal, and outlook of 

world commerce, 17-18 ; que" 



312 



INDEX 



tion of tolls, 27-28, 42; and 
Latin America, 161. 

Pan - American Scientific 
Congress, address to, 95-100. 

Pan-Americanism, basis, 95- 
100 ; essential unity of Amer- 
icas, 95-97 ; economic interde- 
pendence, 97-98; necessity of 
political harmony, 97-99 ; and 
Monroe Doctrine, 99, 130, 
264-265 ; essentials of political 
amity, 99-100; and domestic 
peace, 100; proposed guaran- 
tee of territorial integrity, 
264-265. See also Latin 
America. 

Patriotism, as a principle, 29; 
and honor and sacrifice, 41- 
44; and holidays, 92; teach- 
ing in school, 218-219. See 
also Hyphen ; Loyalty. 

Peace, and self-sacrifice, 33, 75 ; 
and American principles, 88, 
93-94, 101; enforcement of 
world, 121-125; American 
concern and attitude as neu- 
tral, 122, 124-125, 131, 168, 
173-174 ; and open diplomacy, 
122-123, 247-248, 279 ; and im- 
partial justice, 123-124, 278- 
279, 287; fundamentals, 124; 
League, 125, 172-174, 178-179, 
208, 249, 265, 269, 278-280; 
and preparedness, 138; justi- 
fiable breach of world, 164; 
request to belligerents to 
state terms, 167-170 ; replies, 
172 ; address on conditions, 
while still neutral, 172-179; 
no balance of power, 174-175, 
208 ; peace without victory, 
175 ; equality of nations, 175- 
176, 186, 250; democracy and 
recognition of nationality, 
176, 186, 208, 221. 268 ; outlet 
to the sea, 176. 237 ; freedom 
of the seas, 177, 186. 248; 
Tjitation of armaments, 177, 
^, 248 ; Americanism of es- 
ials. 177-179. 186-187. 236- 
\ concert and American 



war objects, 192; concert and 
democracy, 193 ; indemnity, 
reparation, 208. 222, 235, 236, 
248, 249 ; German drives, ob- 
ject, 206-207, 214-216, 228, 234, 
244, 256-257; objections to 
status quo ante, 207, 220-221; 
answer to Papal proposi- 
tions, 219-222; test, 221; none 
with autocracy, 221-222, 233, 
277, 284, 285 ; first war state- 
ment of essentials, 233-237 ; no 
vindictive, 234. 236, 250, 279; 
and internal affairs of Cen- 
tral Powers, 235-236, 249, 
250 ; Brest-Litovsk negotia- 
tions, 244-245 ; frankness, 
246-247, 280-282; Russia and 
definition of terms, 246-247; 
fourteen conditions, 247-249 ; 
colonies, 248 ; conditions as 
to Russia, 248 ; as to Belgium, 
248-249 ; as to France, 249 ; as 
to Italy, 249; as to Austria- 
Hungary. 249 ; as to Balkans, 
249 ; as to Turkey, 249 ; as to 
Poland, 249 ; as to Germany, 
250 ; four conditions, 268-269 ; 
overthrow of autocracy, 268; 
respect for international law, 
268-269; rejection of Aus- 
tria's conference proposal, 
275 ; no compromise. 277-278 ; 
five conditions, 279 ; commer- 
cial freedom, 279; basis of 
common interest of all, 279 ; 
question of armistice, 283- 
286 ; German acceptance of 
conditions. 283-284 : armistice 
signed, effect. 286-289; relief 
of central peoples, 287; revo- 
lution in central governments, 
problem. 287-289. See also 
World War. 

"Peace without victory," 175. 

Penn. William, as spiritual 
knight, 14-15. 

People. See Democracy : Pub- 
lic opinion. 

Persia, German intrigue, 213. 



INDEX 



313 



Philadelphia, address at, 39- 
44, 85-89. 

Philippines, larger self-gov- 
ernment. 13, 58-59. See also 
Dependencies. 

Pittsburgh, address at, 49-55. 

Poland, restoration, 176, 249. 

Politics, control by independ- 
ents, 63 ; defined, 97 ; and pre- 
paredness, 104-105. See also 
Democratic Party ; Republi- 
can Party. 

Pope, answer to peace proposi- 
tions of, 219-222. 

Pou, Representative, letter to, 
100. 

Preparedness, for defense, 93- 
94; address on, 100-105; and 
uncertainty of World War, 
100-101; and militarism, 101- 
102, 104, 128-129; military 
and industrial, 102 ; cruel 
waste in lack, 102-103 ; and 
militia, 103 ; immediate needs, 
103-104 ; naval, 104 ; and poli- 
tics, 104-105; purpose, 127- 
128 ; and peace, 138. 

Presidency, responsibility, 107. 

Prices, war-time regulation, 
200, 255. 

Prohibition, war-time, 260-261. 

Property, protection, 4. 

Provincialism, outgrown, 137, 
185-186. 

Prussia. See Autocracy ; 
World War. 

Public Opinion, and interna- 
tional law, 46-47 ; and munici- 
pal law, 47-48 ; as mainspring 
of administrative action, 61, 
83, 88-89, 107-108; and false 
news, 82-83 ; and experience 
of the nation, 91-92 ; and con- 
ception of America, 133 ; as 
basis of legislation, 135; and 
reform, 141 ; and issues of the 
war, 281. See also Democ- 
racy : Leaders. 

Punishment, effect, 137. 



143-150; legislation recom- 
mended, 148-149; proposed 
federal military operation 
(1910), 149; war-time prob- 
lems, 200 ; reasons for gov- 
ernment control, 238-244 ; 
work of Committee of Rail- 
way Executives, 238-239, 242 ; 
guarantees, 239. 243 ; finan- 
cial aspect of control, 243-244. 

Raw Material, war-time prob- 
lems, 198-201. 

Red Cross, American, appeal as 
neutral to support war work, 
171-172 ; address at dedication 
of building, 202-204; import- 
ance of war work, 202-203; 
support, 203, 258-259; junior 
work, 223-224; address on 
honor to, 256-260; war work 
and American character, 257 ; 
and world friendship, 258 ; 
German violations, 259 ; work 
of women, 259-260. 

Reform, dependent on popular 
support, 141. 

Reparations. See Indemnity. 

Republican Party, unprogres- 
siveness, 62-64. See also Pol- 
itics. 

Resources, development and 
regulation, 57-58. 

Revolution, no external en- 
couragement, 100. 186 ; in cen- 
tral nations, 287-289. See 
also Russia. 

Rights, protection, 4. 

Roosevelt, Theodore, and pub- 
lic opinion, ii. 

Rumania, in peace terms, 249. 
See also Balkans. 

Russia, revolution, 194; mes- 
sage to. 206-208 ; German in- 
trigue, 234 ; Brest-Litovsk ne- 
gotiations. 244-245 ; condition 
and faith. 246-247 ; essentials 
in peace terms, 248 ; Ameri- 
can purpose to support, 257, 
263-264, 268. 



Railroads, eight-hour question, Safety at sea, convention, 60. 



314 



INDEX 



Salesmanship Congress, ad- 
dress at, 132-137. 

Schools, patriotic teaching, 
218-219; and Junior Red 
Cross. 223-224. 

ScoTT, H. L., Indian lore, 126. 

Sea, outlet to. in peace terms, 
176, 237. See also Freedom 
of the seas; Merchant Ma- 
rine. 

Seed, supply by government, 
253. 

Self-Determination of Amer- 
ican life, 30-32, 127-128. 

Serbia, in peace terms, 249. 
See also Balkans. 

Shadow Lawn, address at, 164- 
165. 

Sheppard, Senator, letter to, 
260-261. 

Sherman Antitrust Law, need 
of clarifying, 24-25. See also 
Trusts. 

Sherwood, General, and pre- 
paredness, 138. 

Shipping. See Merchant ma- 
rine. 

Slavery, women and question, 
155. 

Smith-Lever Act, 253. 

Social questions, present, 4; 
rise, 156. 

Socialists, use by autocracy, 
207. 

Soldier and self-sacrifice, 33, 
75 ; courage, 34 ; Bible read- 
ing, 217-218. See also Army. 

South, self-expression. 16 ; and 
war-time agriculture, 200. 

Southern Commercial Con- 
gress, address before. 16-21. 

Spanish-American War, un- 
preparedness. 103. 

Spies. See Intrigue. 

Status Quo Ante Bellum, ob- 
jections to return to. 207, 220- 
221. 

Stone, Senator, letter to, 105- 
107. 

Strikes, war-time, 229. See 
also Labor. 



Submarines, sinking of Lusi- 
tania, illegality, 89-90: no 
submission to illegal warfare, 
105-107; violation of faith, 
106, li4. 115 ; ultimatum on 
warfare, 111-117, 179-186 ; 
German abandonment of pol- 
icy, 120-121, 180; contingency 
denied, 121, 180-181 ; renewal 
of unrestricted warfare, 181- 
182, 188-190 ; protection 
against, 182-183 ; faith in 
abandonment policy, 188 ; im- 
practicability of armed neu- 
trality against, 190. See also 
Freedom of the Seas ; Neu- 
trality; World War. 

Subsidies, German industrial, 
227. 

Supreme Court, qualifications 
of Brandeis. 117-120; on need 
of facts, 145-146. 

"Sussex," sinking, 114, 179. 

Swarthmore College, address 
at, 14-16. 

Taft, W. H.. and public opin- 
ion, ii ; and Confederate 
Monument at Arlington, 35. 

Tariff, need of reform, 3 : ad- 
dress on reform, 6-8 ; protec- 
tion as monopoly. 7 ; reform 
and competition, 8 ; construc- 
tive reform, 8 ; warning on 
lobby, 9. See also Commerce. 

Tariff Commission, and facts, 
160. 

Tennyson, Lord, on patriotism, 
29. 

Territory, no further aggran- 
dizement of American, 19, 
81 ; integrity and Pan-Ameri- 
canism, 99. 

Toledo, address at, 138-139. 

Tolls, on Panama Canal, 27-28, 
42. 

"Too Proud to Fight." 89. 

Trusts, regulation. 22-27 ; 
agreement of opinion on, 22- 
23; constructive reform, 23; 
interlocking directorates, 24; 



INDEX 



clarifying antitrust law, 24- 
25 ; administrative commis- 
sion, 25 ; punishment of indi- 
viduals, 25 ; interlocking 
individual control, 26. See 
also Business. 
Turkey, as German tool, 213, 
214 ; American attitude to- 
ward, 196, 238; and peace 
terms, 235, 249. See also 
Middle Europe Empire ; 
World War. 

Union, restoration, 10, 32, 35. 

United States, elements of 
greatness, 2 ; of evil, 2-3 ; 
Civil War spirit and present 
tasks, 10-13; self-determined 
life, 30-32; purpose, 83, 87, 
127, 129-130, 136; interna- 
tional spirit, 137, 140; power 
and its use, 142 ; rise of social 
questions, 156. 

Unity, American, and World 
War, 187, 203, 204, 209, 216, 
231-233, 257, 274; war and 
world, 257-258, 260. See also 
League of Nations. 

Urbana, message to Farmers' 
Conference at, 251-255. 

Veto, of immigration test bill, 

67-70. 
Villa, F., expedition against, 

no. 
Visit and Search, 84. See 

also Freedom of the Seas; 

Submarines. 

War, and national unity. See 
also Army; Militarism; Pre- 
paredness ; World War. 

War Zones, illegality, 90, 111- 
112. See also Submarines. 

Washington, George, and na- 
tional self-determination, 30; 
as type, 152; and creation of 
nation, 266, 267. 

Waste in American life, 2-3, 
201. 

Watchful waiting, 64-66. 



Water-Power, development and 
regulation, 57-58. 

Webb, Representative, letter to, 
205-206. 

Weizmann Commission, 272. 

West Point, address at, 125- 
131. 

Williams, George, and Y. M. 
C. A., 54. 

Wilson, Woodrow, forms of 
communication with people, 
ii-iii ; habits of speech, iv-v ; 
growth, V. 

Wise, Rabbi, letter to, 272. 

Woman Suffrage, address on, 
154-157 ; growth, 154 ; and so- 
cial questions, 156; force, 
156-157; method, 157; and 
principles of World War, 
224-226. 

Women, memorial to Civil War 
workers, 202, 204 ; in Red 
Cross work, 259-260. See 
also Woman Suffrage. 

World power. United States as, 
39-44, 81, 142. 

World War, Wilson's ad- 
dresses, iii-iv ; appeal for 
American neutrality, 44-46 ; 
effect on neutral industry, 56 ; 
and America at peace, 67 ; 
ideals and spiritual forces, 
77-78 ; uncertainty at end, 
100-101 ; American rights and 
principles, v ; expediency, 
105-109, 117; ultimatum to 
Germany on submarines, 
111-117, 179-180; German 
submission to ultimatum, 120- 
121, 180-181, 188; American 
interest, 121-122, 127 and se- 
cret diplomacy, 122-123; in- 
evitable. 126 ; keeping out of, 
138, 139, 183; origin, 163; 
severance of diplomatic rela- 
tions with Germany, 179-183, 
188-190 ; unavoidable Ameri- 
can problems, 1S4-1S5; Amer- 
ican attitude, 185-ISfi; neces- 
sity of American unity to- 
ward, 187 ; war with Ger- 



3i6 



INDEX 



many, 188-197 ; American 
task, 191-192, 251, 272-273; 
American objects and altru- 
ism, 192-193, 195, 197, 198, 

203, 205, 207-210, 216, 221- 
222, 233, 247, 251-252, 257, 
263 ; German designs and in- 
trigue, 193-195, 211-214, 216; 
United States and Germany's 
alfies, 195-196, 237-238 ; public 
appeal for support, 197-201; 
food problems, 198-201, 252; 
industrial problems, 198-201; 
economy, 201; grimness, 202- 
204; American unity in, 203, 

204, 209, 216, 231-233, 257, 274 ; 
censorship, 205-206; message 
to drafted men, 222-223; la- 
bor and, 229-230, 272-274; 
German aggression and pur- 
pose, 226-228; when won, 
235-236; war with Austria- 
Hungary, 237-238 ; govern- 
ment control of railroads, 
238-244 ; war-time agricul- 
ture, 251-255; duty to win, 



256; and world unity, 257- 
258, 260; prohibition during, 
260-261; birth of United 
States and, 267 ; opposing ele- 
ments, 267-268; as war of 
emancipation, 273 ; purposes 
and issues, 276-277, 280 ; pub- 
lic understanding of issues, 
280-281; people's war, 281; 
message to college corps, 282- 
283 ; renewal impossible 
under armistice, 286; Ameri- 
can share, 286; object at- 
tained, 286-287. See also 
Armistice ; Autocracy ; Free- 
dom of the Seas ; Middle Eu- 
rope Empire; Neutrality; 
Peace ; Preparedness ; Red 
Cross ; Submarines. 

Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation, address on, 49-55; 
elements of stren^h, 49-51; 
atmosphere, 51 ; militancy, 51- 
52; progressive leaders, 52- 
53; progress, 53-54. 

Zionist Movement, 272. 



FEB 3 - 1319' 



^i^y-" 



